Suddenly a man entered the hall. A man who was a stranger to the Assembly, in uniform, wearing the epaulet of a superior officer and a sword by his side. He was a major of the 42d, who came to summon the Representatives to quit their own House. All, Royalists and Republicans alike, rushed upon him. Such was the expression of an indignant eye-witness. General Leydet addressed him in language such as leaves an impression on the cheek rather than on the ear.

"I do my duty, I fulfil my instructions," stammered the officer.

"You are an idiot, if you think you are doing your duty," cried Leydet to him, "and you are a scoundrel if you know that you are committing a crime. Your name? What do you call yourself? Give me your name."

The officer refused to give his name, and replied, "So, gentlemen, you will not withdraw?"

"No."

"I shall go and obtain force."

"Do so."

He left the room, and in actual fact went to obtain orders from the Ministry of the Interior.

The Representatives waited in that kind of indescribable agitation which might be called the Strangling of Right by Violence.

In a short time one of them who had gone out came back hastily, and warned them that two companies of the Gendarmerie Mobile were coming with their guns in their hands.

Marc Dufraisse cried out, "Let the outrage be thorough. Let the coup d'etat find us on our seats. Let us go to the Salle des Seances," he added. "Since things have come to such a pass, let us afford the genuine and living spectacle of an 18th Brumaire."

They all repaired to the Hall of Assembly. The passage was free. The Salle Casimir-Perier was not yet occupied by the soldiers.

They numbered about sixty. Several were girded with their scarves of office. They entered the Hall meditatively.

There, M. de Resseguier, undoubtedly with a good purpose, and in order to form a more compact group, urged that they should all install themselves on the Right side.

"No," said Marc Dufraisse, "every one to his bench." They scattered themselves about the Hall, each in his usual place.

M. Monet, who sat on one of the lower benches of the Left Centre, held in his hand a copy of the Constitution.

Several minutes elapsed. No one spoke. It was the silence of expectation which precedes decisive deeds and final crises, and during which every one seems respectfully to listen to the last instructions of his conscience.

Suddenly the soldiers of the Gendarmerie Mobile, headed by a captain with his sword drawn, appeared on the threshold. The Hall of Assembly was violated. The Representatives rose from their seats simultaneously, shouting "Vive la Republique!"

The Representative Monet alone remained standing, and in a loud and indignant voice, which resounded through the empty hall like a trumpet, ordered the soldiers to halt.

The soldiers halted, looking at the Representatives with a bewildered air.

The soldiers as yet only blocked up the lobby of the Left, and had not passed beyond the Tribune.

Then the Representative Monet read the Articles 36, 37, and 68 of the Constitution.

Articles 36 and 37 established the inviolability of the Representatives. Article 68 deposed the President in the event of treason.

That moment was a solemn one. The soldiers listened in silence.

The Articles having been read, Representative d'Adelsward, who sat on the first lower bench of the Left, and who was nearest to the soldiers, turned towards them and said,—

"Soldiers, you see that the President of the Republic is a traitor, and would make traitors of you. You violate the sacred precinct of rational Representation. In the name of the Constitution, in the name of the Law, we order you to withdraw."

While Adelsward was speaking, the major commanding the Gendarmerie Mobile had entered.

"Gentlemen," said he, "I have orders to request you to retire, and, if you do not withdraw of your own accord, to expel you."

"Orders to expel us!" exclaimed Adelsward; and all the Representatives added, "Whose orders; Let us see the orders. Who signed the orders?"

The major drew forth a paper and unfolded it. Scarcely had he unfolded it than he attempted to replace it in his pocket, but General Leydet threw himself upon him and seized his arm. Several Representatives leant forward, and read the order for the expulsion of the Assembly, signed "Fortoul, Minister of the Marine."

Marc Dufraisse turned towards the Gendarmes Mobiles, and cried out to them,—

"Soldiers, your very presence here is an act of treason. Leave the Hall!"

The soldiers seemed undecided. Suddenly a second column emerged from the door on the right, and at a signal from the commander, the captain shouted,—

"Forward! Turn them all out!"

Then began an indescribable hand-to-hand fight between the gendarmes and the legislators. The soldiers, with their guns in their hands, invaded the benches of the Senate. Repellin, Chanay, Rantion, were forcibly torn from their seats. Two gendarmes rushed upon Marc Dufraisse, two upon Gambon. A long struggle took place on the first bench of the Right, the same place where MM. Odilon Barrot and Abbatucci were in the habit of sitting. Paulin Durrieu resisted violence by force, it needed three men to drag him from his bench. Monet was thrown down upon the benches of the Commissaries. They seized Adelsward by the throat, and thrust him outside the Hall. Richardet, a feeble man, was thrown down and brutally treated. Some were pricked with the points of the bayonets; nearly all had their clothes torn.

The commander shouted to the soldiers, "Rake them out."

It was thus that sixty Representatives of the People were taken by the collar by the coup d'etat, and driven from their seats. The manner in which the deed was executed completed the treason. The physical performance was worthy of the moral performance.

The three last to come out were Fayolle, Teillard-Laterisse, and Paulin Durrieu.

They were allowed to pass by the great door of the Palace, and they found themselves in the Place Bourgogne.

The Place Bourgogne was occupied by the 42d Regiment of the Line, under the orders of Colonel Garderens.

Between the Palace and the statue of the Republic, which occupied the centre of the square, a piece of artillery was pointed at the Assembly opposite the great door.

By the side of the cannon some Chasseurs de Vincennes were loading their guns and biting their cartridges.

Colonel Garderens was on horseback near a group of soldiers, which attracted the attention of the Representatives Teillard-Laterisse, Fayolle, and Paulin Durrieu.

In the middle of this group three men, who had been arrested, were struggling crying, "Long live the Constitution! Vive la Republique!"

Fayolle, Paulin Durrieu, and Teillard-Laterisse approached, and recognized in the three prisoners three members of the majority, Representatives Toupet-des-Vignes Radoubt, Lafosse, and Arbey.

Representative Arbey was warmly protesting. As he raised his voice, Colonel Garderens cut him short with these words, which are worthy of preservation,—

"Hold your tongue! One word more, and I will have you thrashed with the butt-end of a musket."

The three Representatives of the Left indignantly called on the Colonel to release their colleagues.

"Colonel," said Fayolle, "You break the law threefold."

"I will break it sixfold," answered the Colonel, and he arrested Fayolle, Durrieu, and Teillard-Laterisse.

The soldiery were ordered to conduct them to the guard house of the Palace then being built for the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

On the way the six prisoners, marching between a double file of bayonets, met three of their colleagues Representatives Eugene Sue, Chanay, and Benoist (du Rhone).

Eugene Sue placed himself before the officer who commanded the detachment, and said to him,—

"We summon you to set our colleagues at liberty."

"I cannot do so," answered the officer.

"In that case complete your crimes," said Eugene Sue, "We summon you to arrest us also."

The officer arrested them.

They were taken to the guard-house of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and, later on, to the barracks of the Quai d'Orsay. It was not till night that two companies of the line came to transfer them to this ultimate resting-place.

While placing them between his soldiers the commanding officer bowed down to the ground, politely remarking, "Gentlemen, my men's guns are loaded."

The clearance of the hall was carried out, as we have said, in a disorderly fashion, the soldiers pushing the Representatives before them through all the outlets.

Some, and amongst the number those of whom we have just spoken, wens out by the Rue de Bourgogne, others were dragged through the Salle des Pas Perdus towards the grated door opposite the Pont de la Concorde.[3]

The Salle des Pas Perdus has an ante-chamber, a sort of crossway room, upon which opened the staircase of the High Tribune, and several doors, amongst others the great glass door of the gallery which leads to the apartments of the President of the Assembly.

As soon as they had reached this crossway room which adjoins the little rotunda, where the side door of exit to the Palace is situated, the soldiers set the Representatives free.

There, in a few moments, a group was formed, in which the Representatives Canet and Favreau began to speak. One universal cry was raised, "Let us search for Dupin, let us drag him here if it is necessary."

They opened the glass door and rushed into the gallery. This time M. Dupin was at home. M. Dupin, having learnt that the gendarmes had cleared out the Hall, had come out of his hiding-place. The Assembly being thrown prostrate, Dupin stood erect. The law being made prisoner, this man felt himself set free.

The group of Representatives, led by MM. Canet and Favreau, found him in his study.

There a dialogue ensued. The Representatives summoned the President to put himself at their head, and to re-enter the Hall, he, the man of the Assembly, with them, the men of the Nation.

M. Dupin refused point-blank, maintained his ground, was very firm, and clung bravely to his nonentity.

"What do you want me to do?" said he, mingling with his alarmed protests many law maxims and Latin quotations, an instinct of chattering jays, who pour forth all their vocabulary when they are frightened. "What do you want me to do? Who am I? What can I do? I am nothing. No one is any longer anything. Ubi nihil, nihil. Might is there. Where there is Might the people lose their Rights. Novus nascitur ordo. Shape your course accordingly. I am obliged to submit. Dura lex, sed lex. A law of necessity we admit, but not a law of right. But what is to be done? I ask to be let alone. I can do nothing. I do what I can. I am not wanting in good will. If I had a corporal and four men, I would have them killed."

"This man only recognizes force," said the Representatives. "Very well, let us employ force."

They used violence towards him, they girded him with a scarf like a cord round his neck, and, as they had said, they dragged him towards the Hall, begging for his "liberty," moaning, kicking—I would say wrestling, if the word were not too exalted.

Some minutes after the clearance, this Salle des Pas Perdus, which had just witnessed Representatives pass by in the clutch of gendarmes, saw M. Dupin in the clutch of the Representatives.

They did not get far. Soldiers barred the great green folding-doors. Colonel Espinasse hurried thither, the commander of the gendarmerie came up. The butt-ends of a pair of pistols were seen peeping out of the commander's pocket.

The colonel was pale, the commander was pale, M. Dupin was livid. Both sides were afraid. M. Dupin was afraid of the colonel; the colonel assuredly was not afraid of M. Dupin, but behind this laughable and miserable figure he saw a terrible phantom rise up—his crime, and he trembled. In Homer there is a scene where Nemesis appears behind Thersites.

M. Dupin remained for some moments stupefied, bewildered and speechless.

The Representative Gambon exclaimed to him,—

"Now then, speak, M. Dupin, the Left does not interrupt you."

Then, with the words of the Representatives at his back, and the bayonets of the soldiers at his breast, the unhappy man spoke. What his mouth uttered at this moment, what the President of the Sovereign Assembly of France stammered to the gendarmes at this intensely critical moment, no one could gather.

Those who heard the last gasps of this moribund cowardice, hastened to purify their ears. It appears, however, that he stuttered forth something like this:—

"You are Might, you have bayonets; I invoke Right and I leave you. I have the honor to wish you good day."

He went away.

They let him go. At the moment of leaving he turned round and let fall a few more words. We will not gather them up. History has no rag-picker's basket.

[3] This grated door was closed on December 2, and was not reopened until the 12th March, when M. Louis Bonaparte came to inspect the works of the Hall of the Corps Legislatif.



CHAPTER IX.

AN END WORSE THAN DEATH

We should have been glad to have put aside, never to have spoken of him again, this man who had borne for three years this most honorable title, President of the National Assembly of France, and who had only known how to be lacquey to the majority. He contrived in his last hour to sink even lower than could have been believed possible even for him. His career in the Assembly had been that of a valet, his end was that of a scullion.

The unprecedented attitude that M. Dupin assumed before the gendarmes when uttering with a grimace his mockery of a protest, even engendered suspicion. Gambion exclaimed, "He resists like an accomplice. He knew all."

We believe these suspicions to be unjust. M. Dupin knew nothing. Who indeed amongst the organizers of the coup d'etat would have taken the trouble to make sure of his joining them? Corrupt M. Dupin? was it possible? and, further, to what purpose? To pay him? Why? It would be money wasted when fear alone was enough. Some connivances are secured before they are sought for. Cowardice is the old fawner upon felony. The blood of the law is quickly wiped up. Behind the assassin who holds the poniard comes the trembling wretch who holds the sponge.

Dupin took refuge in his study. They followed him. "My God!" he cried, "can't they understand that I want to be left in peace."

In truth they had tortured him ever since the morning, in order to extract from him an impossible scrap of courage.

"You ill-treat me worse than the gendarmes," said he.

The Representatives installed themselves in his study, seated themselves at his table, and, while he groaned and scolded in an arm-chair, they drew up a formal report of what had just taken place, as they wished to leave an official record of the outrage in the archives.

When the official report was ended Representative Canet read it to the President, and offered him a pen.

"What do you want me to do with this?" he asked.

"You are the President," answered Canet. "This is our last sitting. It is your duty to sign the official report."

This man refused.



CHAPTER X.

THE BLACK DOOR

M. Dupin is a matchless disgrace.

Later on he had his reward. It appears that he became some sort of an Attorney-General at the Court of Appeal.

M. Dupin renders to Louis Bonaparte the service of being in his place the meanest of men.

To continue this dismal history.

The Representatives of the Right, in their first bewilderment caused by the coup d'etat, hastened in large numbers to M. Daru, who was Vice-President of the Assembly, and at the same time one of the Presidents of the Pyramid Club. This Association had always supported the policy of the Elysee, but without believing that a coup d'etat was premeditated. M. Daru lived at No. 75, Rue de Lille.

Towards ten o'clock in the morning about a hundred of these Representatives had assembled at M. Daru's home. They resolved to attempt to penetrate into the Hall where the Assembly held its sittings. The Rue de Lille opens out into the Rue de Bourgogne, almost opposite the little door by which the Palace is entered, and which is called the Black Door.

They turned their steps towards this door, with M. Daru at their head. They marched arm in arm and three abreast. Some of them had put on their scarves of office. They took them off later on.

The Black Door, half-open as usual, was only guarded by two sentries.

Some of the most indignant, and amongst them M. de Kerdrel, rushed towards this door and tried to pass. The door, however, was violently shut, and there ensued between the Representatives and the sergents de ville who hastened up, a species of struggle, in which a Representative had his wrist sprained.

At the same time a battalion which was drawn up on the Place de Bourgogne moved on, and came at the double towards the group of Representatives. M. Daru, stately and firm, signed to the commander to stop; the battalion halted, and M. Daru, in the name of the Constitution, and in his capacity as Vice-President of the Assembly, summoned the soldiers to lay down their arms, and to give free passage to the Representatives of the Sovereign People.

The commander of the battalion replied by an order to clear the street immediately, declaring that there was no longer an Assembly; that as for himself, he did not know what the Representatives of the People were, and that if those persons before him did not retire of their own accord, he would drive them back by force.

"We will only yield to violence," said M. Daru.

"You commit high treason," added M. de Kerdrel.

The officer gave the order to charge.

The soldiers advanced in close order.

There was a moment of confusion; almost a collision. The Representatives, forcibly driven back, ebbed into the Rue de Lille. Some of them fell down. Several members of the Right were rolled in the mud by the soldiers. One of them, M. Etienne, received a blow on the shoulder from the butt-end of a musket. We may here add that a week afterwards M. Etienne was a member of that concern which they styled the Consultative Committee. He found the coup d'etat to his taste, the blow with the butt-end of a musket included.

They went back to M. Daru's house, and on the way the scattered group reunited, and was even strengthened by some new-comers.

"Gentlemen," said M. Daru, "the President has failed us, the Hall is closed against us. I am the Vice-President; my house is the Palace of the Assembly."

He opened a large room, and there the Representatives of the Right installed themselves. At first the discussions were somewhat noisy. M. Daru, however, observed that the moments were precious, and silence was restored.

The first measure to be taken was evidently the deposition of the President of the Republic by virtue of Article 68 of the Constitution. Some Representatives of the party which was called Burgraves sat round a table and prepared the deed of deposition.

As they were about to read it aloud a Representative who came in from out of doors appeared at the door of the room, and announced to the Assembly that the Rue de Lille was becoming filled with troops, and that the house was being surrounded.

There was not a moment to lose.

M. Benoist-d'Azy said, "Gentlemen, let us go to the Mairie of the tenth arrondissement; there we shall be able to deliberate under the protection of the tenth legion, of which our colleague, General Lauriston, is the colonel."

M. Daru's house had a back entrance by a little door which was at the bottom of the garden. Most of the Representatives went out that way.

M. Daru was about to follow them. Only himself, M. Odilon Barrot, and two or three others remained in the room, when the door opened. A captain entered, and said to M. Daru,—

"Sir, you are my prisoner."

"Where am I to follow you?" asked M. Daru.

"I have orders to watch over you in your own house."

The house, in truth, was militarily occupied, and it was thus that M. Daru was prevented from taking part in the sitting at the Mairie of the tenth arrondissement.

The officer allowed M. Odilon Barrot to go out.



CHAPTER XI.

THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE

While all this was taking place on the left bank of the river, towards noon a man was noticed walking up and down the great Salles des Pas Perdus of the Palace of Justice. This man, carefully buttoned up in an overcoat, appeared to be attended at a distance by several possible supporters—for certain police enterprises employ assistants whose dubious appearance renders the passers-by uneasy, so much so that they wonder whether they are magistrates or thieves. The man in the buttoned-up overcoat loitered from door to door, from lobby to lobby, exchanging signs of intelligence with the myrmidons who followed him; then came back to the great Hall, stopping on the way the barristers, solicitors, ushers, clerks, and attendants, and repeating to all in a low voice, so as not to be heard by the passers-by, the same question. To this question some answered "Yes," others replied "No." And the man set to work again, prowling about the Palace of Justice with the appearance of a bloodhound seeking the trail.

He was a Commissary of the Arsenal Police.

What was he looking for?

The High Court of Justice.

What was the High Court of Justice doing?

It was hiding.

Why? To sit in Judgment?

Yes and no.

The Commissary of the Arsenal Police had that morning received from the Prefect Maupas the order to search everywhere for the place where the High Court of Justice might be sitting, if perchance it thought it its duty to meet. Confusing the High Court with the Council of State, the Commissary of Police had first gone to the Quai d'Orsay. Having found nothing, not even the Council of State, he had come away empty-handed, at all events had turned his steps towards the Palace of Justice, thinking that as he had to search for justice he would perhaps find it there.

Not finding it, he went away.

The High Court, however, had nevertheless met together.

Where, and how? We shall see.

At the period whose annals we are now chronicling, before the present reconstruction of the old buildings of Paris, when the Palace of Justice was reached by the Cour de Harlay, a staircase the reverse of majestic led thither by turning out into a long corridor called the Gallerie Merciere. Towards the middle of this corridor there were two doors; one on the right, which led to the Court of Appeal, the other on the left, which led to the Court of Cassation. The folding-doors to the left opened upon an old gallery called St. Louis, recently restored, and which serves at the present time for a Salle des Pas Perdus to the barristers of the Court of Cassation. A wooden statue of St. Louis stood opposite the entrance door. An entrance contrived in a niche to the right of this statue led into a winding lobby ending in a sort of blind passage, which apparently was closed by two double doors. On the door to the right might be read "First President's Room;" on the door to the left, "Council Chamber." Between these two doors, for the convenience of the barristers going from the Hall to the Civil Chamber, which formerly was the Great Chamber of Parliament, had been formed a narrow and dark passage, in which, as one of them remarked, "every crime could be committed with impunity."

Leaving on one side the First President's Room and opening the door which bore the inscription "Council Chamber," a large room was crossed, furnished with a huge horse-shoe table, surrounded by green chairs. At the end of this room, which in 1793 had served as a deliberating hall for the juries of the Revolutionary Tribunal, there was a door placed in the wainscoting, which led into a little lobby where were two doors, on the right the door of the room appertaining to the President of the Criminal Chamber, on the left the door of the Refreshment Room. "Sentenced to death!—Now let us go and dine!" These two ideas, Death and Dinner, have jostled against each other for centuries. A third door closed the extremity of this lobby. This door was, so to speak, the last of the Palace of Justice, the farthest off, the least known, the most hidden; it opened into what was called the Library of the Court of Cassation, a large square room lighted by two windows overlooking the great inner yard of the Conciergerie, furnished with a few leather chairs, a large table covered with green cloth, and with law books lining the walls from the floor to the ceiling.

This room, as may be seen, is the most secluded and the best hidden of any in the Palace.

It was here,—in this room, that there arrived successively on the 2d December, towards eleven o'clock in the morning, numerous men dressed in black, without robes, without badges of office, affrighted, bewildered, shaking their heads, and whispering together. These trembling men were the High Court of Justice.

The High Court of Justice, according to the terms of the Constitution, was composed of seven magistrates; a President, four Judges, and two Assistants, chosen by the Court of Cassation from among its own members and renewed every year.

In December, 1851, these seven judges were named Hardouin, Pataille, Moreau, Delapalme, Cauchy, Grandet, and Quesnault, the two last-named being Assistants.

These men, almost unknown, had nevertheless some antecedents. M. Cauchy, a few years previously President of the Chamber of the Royal Court of Paris, an amiable man and easily frightened, was the brother of the mathematician, member of the Institute, to whom we owe the computation of waves of sound, and of the ex-Registrar Archivist of the Chamber of Peers. M. Delapalme had been Advocate-General, and had taken a prominent part in the Press trials under the Restoration; M. Pataille had been Deputy of the Centre under the Monarchy of July; M. Moreau (de la Seine) was noteworthy, inasmuch he had been nicknamed "de la Seine" to distinguish him from M. Moreau (de la Meurthe), who on his side was noteworthy, inasmuch as he had been nicknamed "de la Meurthe" to distinguish him from M. Moreau (de la Seine). The first Assistant, M. Grandet, had been President of the Chamber at Paris. I have read this panegyric of him: "He is known to possess no individuality or opinion of his own whatsoever." The second Assistant, M. Quesnault, a Liberal, a Deputy, a Public Functionary, Advocate-General, a Conservative, learned, obedient, had attained by making a stepping-stone of each of these attributes, to the Criminal Chamber of the Court of Cassation, where he was known as one of the most severe members. 1848 had shocked his notion of Right, he had resigned after the 24th of February; he did not resign after the 2d December.

M. Hardouin, who presided over the High Court, was an ex-President of Assizes, a religious man, a rigid Jansenist, noted amongst his colleagues as a "scrupulous magistrate," living in Port Royal, a diligent reader of Nicolle, belonging to the race of the old Parliamentarians of the Marais, who used to go to the Palais de Justice mounted on a mule; the mule had now gone out of fashion, and whoever visited President Hardouin would have found no more obstinacy in his stable than in his conscience.

On the morning of the 2d December, at nine o'clock, two men mounted the stairs of M. Hardouin's house, No. 10, Rue de Conde, and met together at his door. One was M. Pataille; the other, one of the most prominent members of the bar of the Court of Cassation, was the ex-Constituent Martin (of Strasbourg). M. Pataille had just placed himself at M. Hardouin's disposal.

Martin's first thought, while reading the placards of the coup d'etat, had been for the High Court. M. Hardouin ushered M. Pataille into a room adjoining his study, and received Martin (of Strasbourg) as a man to whom he did not wish to speak before witnesses. Being formally requested by Martin (of Strasbourg) to convene the High Court, he begged that he would leave him alone, declared that the High Court would "do its duty," but that first he must "confer with his colleagues," concluding with this expression, "It shall be done to-day or to-morrow." "To-day or to-morrow!" exclaimed Martin (of Strasbourg); "Mr. President, the safety of the Republic, the safety of the country, perhaps, depends on what the High Court will or will not do. Your responsibility is great; bear that in mind. The High Court of Justice does not do its duty to-day or to-morrow; it does it at once, at the moment, without losing a minute, without an instant's hesitation."

Martin (of Strasbourg) was right, Justice always belongs to To-day.

Martin (of Strasbourg) added, "If you want a man for active work, I am at your service." M. Hardouin declined the offer; declared that he would not lose a moment, and begged Martin (of Strasbourg) to leave him to "confer" with his colleague, M. Pataille.

In fact, he called together the High Court for eleven o'clock, and it was settled that the meeting should take place in the Hall of the Library.

The Judges were punctual. At a quarter-past eleven they were all assembled. M. Pataille arrived the last.

They sat at the end of the great green table. They were alone in the Library.

There was no ceremonial. President Hardouin thus opened the debate: "Gentlemen, there is no need to explain the situation, we all know what it is."

Article 68 of the Constitution was imperative. It was necessary that the High Court should meet under penalty of high treason. They gained time, they swore themselves in, they appointed as Recorder of the High Court M. Bernard, Recorder of the Court of Cassation, and they sent to fetch him, and while waiting requested the librarian, M. Denevers, to hold his pen in readiness. They settled the time and place for an evening meeting. They talked of the conduct of the Constituent Martin (of Strasbourg), with which they were offended, regarding it almost as a nudge of the elbow given by Politics to Justice. They spoke a little of Socialism, of the Mountain, and of the Red Republic, and a little also of the judgment which they had to pronounce. They chatted, they told stories, they found fault, they speculated, they spun out the time.

What were they waiting for?

We have related what the Commissary of police was doing for his part in his department.

And, in reference to this design, when the accomplices of the coup d'etat considered that the people in order to summon the High Court to do its duty, could invade the Palace of Justice, and that they would never look for it where it was assembled, they felt that this room had been excellently chosen. When, however, they considered that the police would also doubtless come to expel the High Court, and that perhaps they would not succeed in finding it, each one regretted to himself the choice of the room. They wished to hide the High Court, they had succeeded too well. It was grievous to think that perhaps when the police and the armed force should arrive, matters would have gone too far, and the High Court would be too deeply compromised.

They had appointed a Recorder, now they must organize a Court. A second step, more serious than the first.

The judges delayed, hoping that fortune would end by deciding on one side or the other, either for the Assembly or for the President, either against the coup d'etat or for it, and that there might thus be a vanquished party, so that the High Court could then with all safety lay its hands upon somebody.

They lengthily argued the question, whether they should immediately decree the accusation of the President, or whether they should draw up a simple order of inquiry. The latter course was adopted.

They drew up a judgment, not the honest and outspoken judgment which was placarded by the efforts of the Representatives of the Left and published, in which are found these words of bad taste, Crime and High Treason; this judgment, a weapon of war, has never existed otherwise than as a projectile. Wisdom in a judge sometimes consists in drawing up a judgment which is not one, one of those judgments which has no binding force, in which everything is conditional; in which no one is incriminated, and nothing, is called by its right name. There are species of intermediate courses which allow of waiting and seeing; in delicate crises men who are in earnest must not inconsiderately mingle with possible events that bluntness which is called Justice. The High Court took advantage of this, it drew up a prudent judgment; this judgment is not known; it is published here for the first time. Here it is. It is a masterpiece of equivocal style:—

EXTRACT FROM THE REGISTRY OF THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE.

"The High Court of Justice.

"According to Article 68 of the Constitution, considering that printed placards beginning with these words, 'The President of the Republic' and ending with the signatures, 'Louis Napoleon Bonaparte' and 'De Morny, Minister of the Interior,' the said placards ordaining amongst other measures the dissolution of the National Assembly, have been posted to-day on the walls of Paris, that this fact of the dissolution of the National Assembly by the President of the Republic would be of the nature to constitute the case provided for by Article 68 of the Constitution, and renders, in the terms of the aforesaid article, the meeting of the High Court indispensable.

"It is declared that the High Court of Justice is organized, that it appoints[4] ... to fulfil with it the functions of the Public Ministry; that M. Bernard, the Recorder of the Court of Cassation, should fulfil the duties of Recorder, and in order to proceed further, according to the terms of the aforesaid Article 68 of the Constitution, the Court will adjourn until to-morrow, the 3d of December, at noon.

"Drawn up and discussed in the Council Chamber, where were sitting MM. Hardouin, president, Pataille, Moreau, Delapalme, and Cauchy, judges, December 2, 1851."

The two Assistants, MM. Grandet and Quesnault, offered to sign the decree, but the President ruled that it would be more correct only to accept the signatures of the titular judges, the Assistants not being qualified when the Court was complete.

In the meantime it was one o'clock, the news began to spread through the palace that a decree of deposition against Louis Bonaparte had been drawn up by a part of the Assembly; one of the judges who had gone out during the debate, brought back this rumor to his colleagues. This coincided with an outburst of energy. The President observed that it would be to the purpose to appoint a Procureur-General.

There was a difficulty. Whom should they appoint? In all preceding trials they had always chosen for a Procureur-General at the High Court the Procureur-General at the Court of Appeal of Paris. Why should they introduce an innovation? They determined upon this Procureur-General of the Court of Appeal. This Procureur-General was at the time M. de Royer, who had been keeper of the Seals for M. Bonaparte. Thence a new difficulty and a long debate.

Would M. de Royer consent? M. Hardouin undertook to go and make the offer to him. He had only to cross the Merciere Gallery.

M. de Royer was in his study. The proposal greatly embarrassed him. He remained speechless from the shock. To accept was serious, to refuse was still more serious.

There was risk of treason. On the 2d December, an hour after noon, the coup d'etat was still a crime. M. de Royer, not knowing whether the high treason would succeed, ventured to stigmatize the deed as such in private, and cast down his eyes with a noble shame before this violation of the laws which, three months later, numerous purple robes, including his own, endorsed with their oaths. But his indignation did not go to the extent of supporting the indictment. An indictment speaks aloud. M. de Royer as yet only murmured. He was perplexed.

M. Hardouin understood this state of conscience. Persistence would have been unreasonable. He withdrew.

He returned to the room where his colleagues were awaiting him.

In the meantime the Commissary of the Arsenal Police had come back.

He had ended by succeeding in "unearthing"—such was his expression—the High Court. He penetrated as far as the Council Chamber of the Civil Chamber; at that moment he had still no other escort than the few police agents of the morning. A boy was passing by. The Commissary asked him the whereabouts of the High Court. "The High Court?" answered the boy; "what is that?" Nevertheless the boy told the Librarian, who came up. A few words were exchanged between M. Denevers and the Commissary.

"What are you asking for?"

"The High Court."

"Who are you?"

"I want the high Court."

"It is in session."

"Where is it sitting?"

"Here."

And the Librarian pointed to the door.

"Very well," said the Commissary.

He did not add another word, and returned into the Merciere Gallery.

We have just said that he was only accompanied at that time by a few police agents.

The High Court was, in truth, in session. The President was relating to the judges his visit to the Procureur General. Suddenly a tumultuous sound of footsteps is heard in the lobby which leads from the Council Chamber to the room where they were deliberating. The door opens abruptly. Bayonets appear, and in the midst of the bayonets a man in a buttoned-up overcoat, with a tricolored sash upon his coat.

The magistrates stare, stupefied.

"Gentlemen," said the man, "dissolve your meeting immediately."

President Hardouin rises.

"What does this mean? Who are you? Are you aware to whom you are speaking?"

"I am aware. You are the High Court, and I am the Commissary of the Police."

"Well, then?"

"Be off."

There were there thirty-five municipal guards, commanded by a lieutenant, and with a drum at their head.

"But——" said the President.

The Commissary interrupted him with these words, which are literally given,—

"Mr. President, I am not going to enter upon an oratorical combat with you. I have my orders, and I transmit them to you. Obey."

"Whom?"

"The Prefect of Police."

The President asked this strange question, which implied the acceptance of an order,—

"Have you a warrant?"

The Commissary answered,—

"Yes."

And he handed a paper to the President.

The judges turned pale.

The President unfolded the paper; M. Cauchy put his head over M. Hardouin's shoulder. The President read but,—

"You are ordered to dissolve the High Court, and, in case of refusal, to arrest MM. Beranger, Rocher, De Boissieux, Pataille, and Hello."

And, turning towards the judges, the President added,—

"Signed, Maupas."

Then, addressing himself to the Commissary, he resumed,—

"There is some mistake, these are not our names. MM. Beranger, Rocher, and De Boissieux have served their time and are no longer judges of the High Court; as for M. Hello, he is dead."

The High Court, in reality, was temporary and renewable; the coup d'etat overthrew the Constitution, but did not understand it. The warrant signed "Maupas" was applicable to the preceding High Court. The coup d'etat had been misled by an old list. Such is the heedlessness of assassins.

"Mr. Commissary of Police," continued the President, "you see that these names are not ours."

"That does not matter to me," replied the Commissary. "Whether this warrant does or does not apply to you, disperse, or I shall arrest all of you."

And he added,—

"At once."

The judges were silenced; one of them picked up from the table a loose sheet of paper, which was the judgment they had drawn up, and put the paper in his pocket.

Then they went away.

The Commissary pointed to the door where the bayonets were, and said,—

"That way."

They went out by the lobby between two ranks of soldiers. The detachment of Republican Guards escorted them as far as the St. Louis Gallery.

There they set them free; their heads bowed down.

It was about three o'clock.

While these events were taking place in the Library, close by, in the former great Chamber of the Parliament, the Court of Cassation was sitting in judgment as usual, without noticing what was happening so near at hand. It would appear, then, that the police exhaled no odor.

Let us at once have done with this High Court.

In the evening at half-past seven the seven judges met together at the house of one of their number, he who had taken away the decree; they framed an official report, drew up a protest, and recognizing the necessity of filling in the line left blank in their decree, on the proposition of M. Quesnault, appointed as Procureur-General M. Renouard, their colleague at the Court of Cessation. M. Renouard, who was immediately informed, consented.

They met together for the last time on the next day, the 3d, at eleven o'clock in the morning, an hour before the time mentioned in the judgment which we have read above,—again in the Library of the Court of Cassation. M. Renouard was present. An official minute was given to him, recording his appointment, as well as certain details with which he asked to be supplied. The judgment which had been drawn up was taken by M. Quesnault to the Recorder's Office, and immediately entered upon the Register of the Secret Deliberations of the Court of Cassation, the High Court not having a Special Register, and having decided, from its creation, to use the Register of the Court of Cassation. After the decree they also transcribed the two documents described as follows on the Register:—

I. An official report recording the interference of the police during the discussion upon the preceding decree.

II. A minute of the appointment of M. Renouard to the office of Procureur-General.

In addition seven copies of these different documents drawn up by the hands of the judges themselves, and signed by them all, were put in a place of safety, as also, it is said, a note-book, in which were written five other secret decisions relating to the coup d'etat.

Does this page of the Register of the Court of Cassation exist at the present time? Is it true, as has been stated, that the prefect Maupas sent for the Register and tore out the leaf containing the decree? We have not been able to clear up this point. The Register now is shown to no one, and those employed at the Recorder's Office are dumb.

Such are the facts, let us summarize them. If this Court so called "High," had been of a character to conceive such an idea as that of doing its duty—when it had once met together the mere organization of itself was a matter of a few minutes—it would have proceeded resolutely and rapidly, it would have appointed as Procureur-General some energetic man belonging to the Court of Cassation, either from the body of magistrates, such as Freslon, or from the bar, like Martin (of Strasbourg). By virtue of Article 68, and without waiting the initiative of the Assembly, it would have drawn up a judgment stigmatizing the crime, it would have launched an order of arrest against the President and his accomplices and have ordered the removal of the person of Louis Bonaparte to jail. As for the Procureur-General he would have issued a warrant of arrest. All this could have been done by half-past eleven, and at that time no attempt had been made to dissolve the High Court. These preliminary proceedings concluded, the High Court, by going out through a nailed-up door leading into the Salle des Pas Perdus, could have descended into the street, and there have proclaimed its judgment to the people. At this time it would have met with no hindrance. Finally, and this in any case, it should have sat robed on the Judges' Bench, with all magisterial state, and when the police agent and his soldiers appeared should have ordered the soldiers, who perhaps would have obeyed them, to arrest the agent, and if the soldiers had disobeyed, should have allowed themselves to be formally dragged to prison, so that the people could see, under their own eyes, out in the open street, the filthy hoof of the coup d'etat trampling upon the robe of Justice.

Instead of this, what steps did the High Court take? We have just seen.

"Be off with you!"

"We are going."

We can imagine, after a very different fashion, the dialogue between Mathieu Mole and Vidocq.

[4] This line was left blank. It was filled in later on with the name of M. Renouard, Councillor of the Court of Cassation.



CHAPTER XII.

THE MAIRIE OF THE TENTH ARRONDISSEMENT

The Representatives, having come out from M. Daru, rejoined each other and assembled in the street. There they consulted briefly, from group to group. There were a large number of them. In less than an hour, by sending notices to the houses on the left bank of the Seine alone, on account of the extreme urgency, more than three hundred members could be called together. But where should they meet? At Lemardelay's? The Rue Richelieu was guarded. At the Salle Martel? It was a long way off. They relied upon the Tenth Legion, of which General Lauriston was colonel. They showed a preference for the Mairie of the Tenth Arrondissement. Besides, the distance was short, and there was no need to cross any bridges.

They formed themselves into column, and set forth.

M. Daru, as we have said, lived in the Rue de Lille, close by the Assembly. The section of the Rue de Lille lying between his house and the Palais Bourbon was occupied by infantry. The last detachment barred his door, but it only barred it on the right, not on the left. The Representatives, on quitting M. Daru, bent their steps on the side of the Rue des Saints-Peres, and left the soldiers behind them. At that moment the soldiers had only been instructed to prevent their meeting in the Palace of the Assembly; they could quietly form themselves into a column in the street, and set forth. If they had turned to the right instead of to the left, they would have been opposed. But there were no orders for the other alternative; they passed through a gap in the instructions.

An hour afterwards this threw St. Arnaud into a fit of fury.

On their way fresh Representatives came up and swelled the column. As the members of the Right lived for the most part in the Faubourg St. Germain, the column was composed almost entirely of men belonging to the majority.

At the corner of the Quai d'Orsay they met a group of members of the Left, who had reunited after their exit from the Palace of the Assembly, and who were consulting together. There were the Representatives Esquiros, Marc Dufraisse, Victor Hennequin, Colfavru, and Chamiot.

Those who were marching at the head of the column left their places, went up to the group, and said, "Come with us."

"Where are you going?" asked Marc Dufraisse.

To the Mairie of the Tenth Arrondissement."

"What do you intend to do there?"

"To decree the deposition of Louis Bonaparte."

"And afterwards?"

"Afterwards we shall go in a body to the Palace of the Assembly; we will force our way in spite of all resistance, and from the top of the steps we will read out the decree of deposition to the soldiers."

"Very good, we will join you," said Mare Dufraisse.

The five members of the Left marched at some distance from the column. Several of their friends who were mingled with the members of the Right rejoined them; and we may here mention a fact without giving it more importance than it possesses, namely, that the two fractions of the Assembly represented in this unpremeditated gathering marched towards the Mairie without being mingled together; one on each side of the street. It chanced that the men of the majority kept on the right side of the street, and the men of the minority on the left.

No one had a scarf of office. No outward token caused them to be recognized. The passers-by stared at them with surprise, and did not understand what was the meaning of this procession of silent men through the solitary streets of the Faubourg St. Germain. One district of Paris was as yet unaware of the coup d'etat.

Strategically speaking, from a defensive point of view, the Mairie of the tenth Arrondissement was badly chosen. Situated in a narrow street in that short section of the Rue de Grenelle-St.-Germain which lies between the Rue des Saints-Peres and the Rue du Sepulcre, close by the cross-roads of the Croix-Rouge, where the troops could arrive from so many different points, the Mairie of the Tenth Arrondissement, confined, commanded, and blockaded on every side, was a pitiful citadel for the assailed National Representation. It is true that they no longer had the choice of a citadel, any more than later on they had the choice of a general.

Their arrival at the Mairie might have seemed a good omen. The great gate which leads into a square courtyard was shut; it opened. The post of the National Guards, composed of some twenty men, took up their arms and rendered military honors to the Assembly. The Representatives entered, a Deputy Mayor received them with respect on the threshold of the Mairie. "The Palace of the Assembly is closed by the troops," said the Representatives, "we have come to deliberate here." The Deputy Mayor led them to the first story, and admitted them to the Great Municipal Hall. The National Guard cried, "Long live the National Assembly!"

The Representatives having entered, the door was shut. A crowd began to gather in the street and shouted "Long live the Assembly!" A certain number of strangers to the Assembly entered the Mairie at the same time as the Representatives. Overcrowding was feared, and two sentries were placed at a little side-door, which was left open, with orders only to allow members of the Assembly who might come afterwards to enter. M. Howyn Tranchere stationed himself at this door, and undertook to identify them.

On their arrival at the Mairie, the Representatives numbered somewhat under three hundred. They exceeded this number later on. It was about eleven o'clock in the morning. All did not go up at once into the hall where the meeting was to take place. Several, those of the Left in particular, remained in the courtyard, mingling with the National Guards and citizens.

They talked of what they were going to do.

This was the first difficulty.

The Father of the meeting was M. de Keratry.

Was he going to preside?

The Representatives who were assembled in the Great Hall were in his favor.

The Representatives remaining in the courtyard hesitated.

Marc Dufraisse went up to MM. Jules de Lasteyrie and Leon de Maleville, who had stayed behind with the Representatives of the Left, and said to them, "What are they thinking of upstairs? To make Keratry President? The name of Keratry would frighten the people as thoroughly as mine would frighten the middle classes."

A member of the Right, M. de Keranflech, came up, and intending to support the objection, added, "And then, think of Keratry's age. It is madness to pit a man of eighty against this hour of danger."

But Esquiros exclaimed,—

"That is a bad reason! Eighty years! They constitute a force."

"Yes; where they are well borne," said Colfavru. "Keratry bears them badly."

"Nothing is greater," resumed Esquiros, "than great octogenarians."

"It is glorious," added Chamiot, "to be presided over by Nestor."

"No, by Gerontes,"[5] said Victor Hennequin.

These words put an end to the debate. Keratry was thrown out. MM. Leon de Maleville and Jules de Lasteyrie, two men respected by all parties, undertook to make the members of the Right listen to reason. It was decided that the "bureau"[6] should preside. Five members of the "bureau" were present; two Vice-Presidents, MM. Benoist d'Azy and Vitet, and three Secretaries, MM. Griumult, Chapot, and Moulin. Of the two other Vice-Presidents, one, General Bedrau, was at Mazas; the other, M. Daru, was under guard in his own house. Of the three other Secretaries, two, MM. Peapin and Lacaze, men of the Elysee, were absentees; the other, M. Yvan, a member of the Left, was at the meeting of the Left, in the Rue Blanche, which was taking place almost at the same moment.

In the meantime an usher appeared on the steps of the Mairie, and cried out, as on the most peaceful days of the Assembly, "Representatives, to the sitting!"

This usher, who belonged to the Assembly, and who had followed it, shared its fortunes throughout this day, the sequestration on the Quai d'Orsay included.

At the summons of the usher all the Representatives in the courtyard, and amongst whom was one of the Vice-Presidents, M. Vitei, went upstairs to the Hall, and the sitting was opened.

This sitting was the last which the Assembly held under regular conditions. The Left, which, as we have seen, had on its side boldly recaptured the Legislative power, and had added to it that which circumstances required—as was the duty of Revolutionists; the Left, without a "bureau," without an usher, and without secretaries, held sittings in which the accurate and passionless record of shorthand was wanting, but which live in our memories and which History will gather up.

Two shorthand writers of the Assembly, MM. Grosselet and Lagache, were present at the sitting at the Mairie of the Tenth Arrondissement. They have been able to record it. The censorship of the victorious coup d'etat has mutilated their report and has published through its historians this mangled version as the true version. One lie more. That does not matter. This shorthand recital belongs to the brief of the 2d December, it is one of the leading documents in the trial which the future will institute. In the notes of this book will be found this document complete. The passages in inverted commas are those which the censorship of M. Bonaparte has suppressed. This suppression is a proof of their significance and importance.

Shorthand reproduces everything except life. Stenography is an ear. It hears and sees not. It is therefore necessary to fill in here the inevitable blanks of the shorthand account.

In order to obtain a complete idea of this sitting of the Tenth Arrondissement, we must picture the great Hall of the Mairie, a sort of parallelogram, lighted on the right by four or five windows overlooking the courtyard; on the left, along the wall, furnished with several rows of benches which had been hastily brought thither, on which were piled up the three hundred Representatives, assembled together by chance. No one was sitting down, those in front were standing, those behind were mounted on the benches. Here and there were a few small tables. In the centre people walked to and fro. At the bottom, at the end opposite the door, was a long table furnished with benches, which occupied the whole width of the wall, behind which sat the "bureau." "Sitting" is merely the conventional term. The "bureau" did not "sit;" like the rest of the Assembly it was on its feet. The secretaries, M.M. Chapot, Moulin, and Grimault wrote standing. At certain moments the two Vice-Presidents mounted on the benches so as to be better seen from all points of the room. The table was covered by an old green tablecloth, stained with ink, three or four inkstands had been brought in, and a quire of paper was scattered about. There the decrees were written as soon as they were drawn up. They multiplied the copies, some Representatives became secretaries on the spur of the moment, and helped the official secretaries.

This great hall was on a level with the landing. It was situated, as we have said, on the first floor; it was reached by a very narrow staircase.

We must recollect that nearly the whole of the members present were members of the Right.

The first moment was a serious one. Berryer came out to advantage. Berryer, like all those extemporizers without style, will only be remembered as a name, and a much disputed name, Berryer having been rather a special pleader than an orator who believed what he said. On that day Berryer was to the point, logical and earnest. They began by this cry, "What shall we do?" "Draw up a declaration," said M. de Falloux. "A protest," said M. de Flavigny. "A decree," said Berryer.

In truth a declaration was empty air, a protest was noise, a decree was action. They cried out, "What decree?" "Deposition," said Berryer. Deposition was the extreme limit of the energy of the Right. Beyond deposition, there was outlawry; deposition was practicable for the Right, outlawry was only possible for the Left. In fact it was the Left who outlawed Louis Bonaparte. They did it at their first meeting in the Rue Blanche. We shall see this later on. At deposition, Legality came to an end; at outlawry, the Revolution began. The recurrence of Revolutions are the logical consequences of coups d'etat. The deposition having been voted, a man who later on turned traitor, Quentin Bauchart, exclaimed, "Let us all sign it." All signed it. Odilon Barrot came in and signed it. Antony Thouret came in and signed it. Suddenly M. Piscatory announced that the Mayor was refusing to allow Representatives who had arrived to enter the Hall. "Order him to do so by decree," said Berryer. And the decree was voted. Thanks to this decree, MM. Favreau and Monet entered; they came from the Legislative Palace; they related the cowardice of Dupin. M. Dahirel, one of the leaders of the Right, was exasperated, and said, "We have received bayonet thrusts." Voices were raised, "Let us summon the Tenth Legion. Let the call to arms be beaten. Lauriston hesitates. Let us order him to protect the Assembly." "Let us order him by decree," said Berryer. This decree was drawn up, which, however, did not prevent Lauriston from refusing. Another decree, again proposed by Berryer, pronounced any one who had outraged the Parliamentary inviolability to be a traitor, and ordered the immediate release of those Representatives who had been wrongfully made prisoners. All this was voted at once without debate, in a sort of great unanimous confusion, and in the midst of a storm of fierce conversations. From time to time Berryer imposed silence. Then the angry outcries broke forth again. "The coup d'etat will not dare to come here." "We are masters here." "We are at home." "It would be impossible to attack us here." "These wretches will not dare to do so." If the uproar had been less violent, the Representatives might have heard through the open windows close at hand, the sound of soldiers loading their guns.

A regiment of Chasseurs of Vincennes had just entered silently into the garden of the Mairie, and, while waiting for orders, were loading their guns.

Little by little the sitting, at first disorderly and tumultuous, had assumed an ordinary aspect. The uproar had relapsed into a murmur. The voice of the usher, crying "Silence, gentlemen," had succeeded in overcoming the hubbub. Every moment fresh Representatives came in, and hastened to sign the decree of deposition at the "bureau." As there was a great crowd round the "bureau" waiting to sign, a dozen loose sheets of paper to which the Representatives affixed their signatures were circulated in the great Hall and the two adjoining rooms.

The first to sign the decree of deposition was M. Dufaure, the last was M. Betting de Lancastel. Of the two Presidents, one, M. Benoist d'Azy, was addressing the Assembly; the other, M. Vitet, pale, but calm and resolute, distributed instructions and orders. M. Benoist d'Azy maintained a decorous countenance, but a certain hesitation in his speech revealed an inner agitation. Divisions, even in the Right, had not disappeared at this critical moment. A Legitimist member was overheard saying in a low voice, while speaking of one of the Vice-Presidents, "This great Vitet looks like a whited sepulchre." Vitet was an Orleanist.

Given this adventurer with whom they had to deal, this Louis Bonaparte, capable of everything, the hour and the man being wrapt in mystery, some Legitimist personages of a candid mind were seriously but comically frightened. The Marquis of ——, who acted the fly on the coach-wheel to the Right, went hither and thither, harangued, shouted, declaimed, remonstrated, proclaimed, and trembled. Another, M. A—— N——, perspiring, red-faced, out of breath, rushed about distractedly. "Where is the guard? How many men are there? Who commands them? The officer! send me the officer! Long live the Republic! National Guard, stand firm! Long live the Republic!" All the Right shouted this cry. "You wish then to kill it," said Esquiros. Some of them were dejected; Bourbousson maintained the silence of a vanquished placeman. Another, the Viscount of ——, a relative of the Duke of Escars, was so alarmed that every moment he adjourned to a corner of the courtyard. In the crowd which filled the courtyard there was a gamin of Paris, a child of Athens, who has since become am elegant and charming poet, Albert Glatigny. Albert Glatigny cried out to this frightened Viscount, "Hulloa there! Do you think that coups d'etat are extinguished in the way Gulliver put out the fire?"

Oh, Laughter, how gloomy you are when attended with Tragedy!

The Orleanists were quieter, and maintained a more becoming attitude. This arose from the fact that they ran greater danger.

Pascal Duprat replaced at the top of the decrees the words, "Republique Francaise," which had been forgotten.

From time to time men who were not speaking on the subject of the moment mentioned this strange word, "Dupin," open which there ensued shouts of derision and bursts of laughter. "Utter the name of that coward no more," cried Antony Thouret.

There were motions and counter-motions; it was a continual uproar interrupted by deep and solemn silences. Alarmist phrases circulated from group to group. "We are in a blind alley." "We are caught here as in a rat trap;" and then on each motion voices were raised: "That is it!" "It is right!" "It is settled!" They agreed in a low voice upon a rendezvous at No. 19, Rue de la Chaussee-d'Antin, in case they should be expelled from the Mairie. M. Bixio carried off the decree of deposition to get it printed. Esquiros, Marc Dufraisse, Pascal Duprat, Rigal, Lherbette, Chamiot, Latrade, Colfavru, Antony Thouret, threw in here and there energetic words of advice. M. Dufaure, resolute and indignant, protested with authority. M. Odilon Barrot, motionless in a corner, maintained the silence of stupefied silliness.

MM. Passy and de Tocqueville, in the midst of the groups, described that when they were Ministers they had always entertained an uneasy suspicion of a coup d'etat, and that they clearly perceived this fixed idea in the brain of Louis Bonaparte. M. de Tocqueville added, "I said to myself every night, 'I lie down to sleep a Minister; what if I should awake a prisoner?'" Some of those men who were termed "men of order," muttered while signing the degree of deposition, "Beware of the Red Republic!" and seemed to entertain an equal fear of failure and of success. M. de Vatimesnil pressed the hands of the men of the Left, and thanked them for their presence. "You make us popular," said he. And Antony Thouret answered him, "I know neither Right nor Left to-day; I only see the Assembly."

The younger of the two shorthand writers handed their written sheets to the Representatives who had spoken, and, asked them to revise them at once, saying, "We shall not have the time to read them over." Some Representatives went down into the street, and showed the people copies of the decree of deposition, signed by the members of the "bureau." One of the populace took one of these copies, and cried out, "Citizens! the ink is still quite wet! Long live the Republic!"

The Deputy-Mayor stood at the door of the Hall; the staircase was crowded with National Guards and spectators. In the Assembly several had penetrated into the Hall, and amongst them the ex-Constituent Beslay, a man of uncommon courage. It was at first wished to turn them out, but they resisted, crying, "This is our business. You are the Assembly, but we are the People." "They are right," said M. Berryer.

M. de Falloux, accompanied by M. de Keranflech, came up the Constituent Beslay, and leaned by his side on the stove, saying to him, "Good-day, colleague;" and reminded him that they both had formed part of the Committee of the National Workshops, and that they had together visited the Workmen at the Parc Monceaux. The Right felt themselves falling; they became affectionate towards Republicans. The Republic is called To-morrow.

Each spoke from his place; this member upon a bench, that member on a chair, a few on the tables. All contradictory opinions burst forth at once. In a corner some ex-leaders of "order" were scared at the possible triumph of the "Reds." In another the men of the Right surrounded the men of the Left, and asked them: "Are not the faubourgs going to rise?"

The narrator has but one duty, to tell his story; he relates everything, the bad as well as the good. Whatever may have taken place, however, and notwithstanding all these details of which it was our duty to speak, apart from the exceptions which we had mentioned, the attitude of the men of the Right who composed the large majority of this meeting was in many respects honorable and worthy. Some of them, as we have just mentioned, even prided themselves upon their resolution and their energy, almost as though they had wished to rival the members of the Left.

We may here remark—for in the course of this narrative we shall more than once see the gaze of some members of the Right turned towards the people, and in this no mistake should be made—that these monarchical men who talked of popular insurrection and who invoked the faubourgs were a minority in the majority,—an imperceptible minority. Antony Thouret proposed to those who were leaders there to go in a body through the working-class neighborhoods with the decree of deposition in their hands. Brought to bay, they refused. They declared that they would only protect themselves by organized powers, not by the people. It is a strange thing to say, but it must be noted, that with their habits of political shortsightedness, the popular armed resistance, even in the name of the Law, seemed sedition to them. The utmost appearance of revolution which they could endure was a regiment of the National Guard, with their drums at their head; they shrank from the barricade; Right in a blouse was no longer Right, Truth armed with a pike was no longer Truth, Law unpaving a street gave them the impression of a Fury. In the main, however, and taking them for what they were, and considering their position as politicians, these members of the Right were well-advised. What would they have done with the people? And what would the people have done with them? How would they have proceeded to set fire to the masses? Imagine Falloux as a tribune, fanning the Faubourg St. Antoine into a flame!

Alas! in the midst of this dense gloom, in these fatal complications of circumstances by which the coup d'etat profited so odiously and so perfidiously, in that mighty misunderstanding which comprised the whole situation, for kindling the revolutionary spark in the heart of the people, Danton himself would not have sufficed.

The coup d'etat entered into this meeting impudently, with its convict's cap on its head. It possessed an infamous assurance there, as well as everywhere else. There were in this majority three hundred Representatives of the People. Louis Napoleon sent a sergeant to drive them away. The Assembly, having resisted the sergeant, he sent an officer, the temporary commander of the sixth battalion of the Chasseurs de Vincennes. This officer, young, fair-haired, a scoffer, half laughing, half threatening, pointed with his finger to the stairs filled with bayonets, and defied the Assembly. "Who is this young spark?" asked a member of the Right. A National Guard who was there said, "Throw him out of the window!" "Kick him downstairs!" cried one of the people.

This Assembly, grievous as were its offences against the principles of the Revolution—and with these wrongs Democracy alone had the right to reproach it—this Assembly, I repeat, was the National Assembly, that is to say, the Republic incarnate, the living Universal Suffrage, the Majesty of the Nation, upright and visible. Louis Bonaparte assassinated this Assembly, and moreover insulted it. A slap on the face is worse than a poniard thrust.

The gardens of the neighborhood occupied by the troops were full of broken bottles. They had plied the soldiers with drink. They obeyed the "epaulettes" unconditionally, and according to the expression of eyewitnesses, appeared "dazed-drunk." The Representatives appealed to them, and said to them, "It is a crime!" They answered, "We are not aware of it."

One soldier was heard to say to another, "What have you done with your ten francs of this morning?"

The sergeants hustled the officers. With the exception of the commander, who probably earned his cross of honor, the officers were respectful, the sergeants brutal.

A lieutenant showing signs of flinching, a sergeant cried out to him, "You are not the only one who commands here! Come, therefore, march!"

M. de Vatimesnil asked a soldier, "Will you dare to arrest us—us, the Representatives of the People?"

"Assuredly!" said the soldier.

Several soldiers hearing some Representatives say that they had eaten nothing since the morning, offered them their ration bread. Some Representatives accepted. M. de Tocqueville, who was unwell, and who was noticed to be pale and leaning on the sill of a window, received from a soldier a piece of this bread, which he shared with M. Chambolle.

Two Commissaries of Police appeared in "full dress," in black coats girded with their sash-girdles and their black corded hats. One was an old man, the other a young man. The first was named Lemoine-Tacherat, and not Bacherel, as has been wrongly printed: the second was named Barlet. These names should be noted. The unprecedented assurance of this Barlet was remarked. Nothing was wanting in him,—cynical speech, provoking gesture, sardonic intonation. It was with an inexpressible air of insolence that Barlet, when summoning the meeting to dissolve itself, added, "Rightly or Wrongly." They murmured on the benches of the Assembly, "Who is this scoundrel?" The other, compared to him, seemed moderate and inoffensive. Emile Pean exclaimed, "The old man is simply working in his profession, but the young man is working out his promotion."

Before this Tacherat and this Barlet entered, before the butts of the muskets had been heard ringing on the stones of the staircase, this Assembly had talked of resistance. Of what kind of resistance? We have just stated. The majority could only listen to a regular organized resistance, a military resistance in uniform and in epaulets. Such a resistance was easy to decree, but it was difficult to organize. The Generals on whom the Assembly were accustomed to rely having been arrested, there only remained two possible Generals, Oudinot and Lauriston. General Marquis de Lauriston, ex-peer of France, and at the same time Colonel of the Tenth Legion and Representative of the People, drew a distinction between his duty as Representative and his duty as Colonel. Summoned by some of his friends of the Right to beat to arms and call together the Tenth Legion, he answered, "As Representative of the People I ought to indict the Executive Power, but as Colonel I ought to obey it." It appears that he obstinately shut himself up in this singular reasoning, and that it was impossible to draw him out of it.

"How stupid he is!" said Piscatory.

"How sharp he is!" said Falloux.

The first officer of the National Guard who appeared in uniform, seemed to be recognized by two members of the Right, who said, "It is M. de Perigord!" They made a mistake, it was M. Guilbot, major of the third battalion of the Tenth Legion. He declared that he was ready to march on the first order from his Colonel, General Lauriston. General Lauriston went down into the courtyard, and came up a moment afterwards, saying, "They do not recognize my authority. I have just resigned," Moreover, the name of Lauriston was not familiar to the soldiers. Oudinot was better known in the army. But how?

At the moment when the name of Oudinot was pronounced, a shudder ran through this meeting, almost exclusively composed of members of the Right. In fact at this critical time, at this fatal name of Oudinot, reflections crowded upon each other in every mind.

What was the coup d'etat?

It was the "Roman expedition at home." Which was undertaken against whom? Against those who had undertaken the "Roman expedition abroad." The National Assembly of France, dissolved by violence, could find only one single General to defend it in its dying hour. And whom? Precisely he, who in the name of the National Assembly of France had dissolved by violence the National Assembly of Rome. What power could Oudinot, the strangler of a Republic, possess to save a Republic? Was it not evident that his own soldiers would answer him, "What do you want with us? That which we have done at Rome we now do at Paris." What a story is this story of treason! The French Legislature had written the first chapter with the blood of the Roman Constituent Assembly: Providence wrote the second chapter with the blood of the French Legislature, Louis Bonaparte holding the pen.

In 1849, Louis Bonaparte had assassinated the sovereignty of the People in the person of its Roman Representatives; in 1851 he assassinated it in the person of its French Representatives. It was logical, and although it was infamous, it was just. The Legislative Assembly bore at the same time the weight of two crimes; it was the accomplice of the first, the victim of the second. All these men of the majority felt this, and were humbled. Or rather it was the same crime, the crime of the Second of July, 1849, ever erect, ever alive, which had only changed its name, which now called itself the Second of December, and which, the offspring of this Assembly, stabbed it to the heart. Nearly all crimes are parricidal. On a certain day they recoil upon those who have committed them, and slay them.

At this moment, so full of anxiety, M. de Falloux must have glanced round for M. de Montalembert. M. de Montalembert was at the Elysee.

When Tamisier rose and pronounced this terrifying word, "The Roman Question?" distracted M. de Dampierre shouted to him, "Silence! You kill us!"

It was not Tamisier who was killing them—it was Oudinot.

M. de Dampierre did not perceive that he cried "Silence!" to history.

And then without even reckoning the fatal remembrance which at such a moment would have crushed a man endowed in the highest degree with great military qualities, General Oudinot, in other respects an excellent officer, and a worthy son of his brave father, possessed none of those striking qualities which in the critical hour of revolution stir the soldier and carry with them the people. At that instant to win back an army of a hundred thousand men, to withdraw the balls from the cannons' mouths, to find beneath the wine poured out to the Praetorians the true soul of the French soldier half drowned and nearly dead, to tear the flag from the coup d'etat and restore it to the Law, to surround the Assembly with thunders and lightnings, it would have needed one of those men who exist no longer; it would have needed the firm hand, the calm oratory, the cold and searching glance of Desaix, that French Phocion; it would have needed the huge shoulders, the commanding stature, the thundering voice, the abusive, insolent, cynical, gay, and sublime eloquence of Kleber, that military Mirabeau. Desaix, the countenance of a just man, or Kleber, the face of the lion! General Oudinot, little, awkward, embarrassed, with an indecisive and dull gaze, red cheeks, low forehead, with grizzled and lank hair, polite tone of voice, a humble smile, without oratory, without gesture, without power, brave before the enemy, timid before the first comer, having assuredly the bearing of a soldier, but having also the bearing of a priest; he caused the mind to hesitate between the sword and the taper; he had in his eyes a sort of "Amen!"

He had the best intentions in the world, but what could he do? Alone, without prestige, without true glory, without personal authority, and dragging Rome after him! He felt all this himself, and he was as it were paralyzed by it. As soon as they had appointed him he got upon a chair and thanked the Assembly, doubtless with a firm heart, but with hesitating speech. When the little fair-haired officer dared to look him in the face and insult him, he, holding the sword of the people, he, General of the sovereign Assembly, he only knew how to stammer out such wretched phrases as these, "I have just declared to you that we are unable, 'unless compelled and constrained,' to obey the order which prohibits us from remaining assembled together." He spoke of obeying, he who ought to command. They had girded him with his scarf, and it seemed to make him uncomfortable. He inclined his head alternately first to one shoulder and then to the other; he held his hat and cane in his hand, he had a benevolent aspect. A Legitimist member muttered in a low voice to his neighbor, "One might imagine he was a bailiff speechifying at a wedding." And his neighbor, a Legitimist also, replied, "He reminds me of the Duc d'Angouleme."

What a contrast to Tamisier! Tamisier, frank, earnest confident, although a mere Captain of Artillery, had the bearing of a General. Had Tamisier, with his grave and gentle countenance, high intelligence, and dauntless heart, a species of soldier-philosopher, been better known, he could have rendered decisive services. No one can tell what would have happened if Providence had given the soul of Tamisier to Oudinot, or the epaulets of Oudinot to Tamisier.

In this bloody enterprise of December we failed to find a General's uniform becomingly worn. A book might be written on the part which gold lace plays in the destiny of nations.

Tamisier, appointed Chief of the Staff some instants before the invasion of the hall, placed himself at the disposal of the Assembly. He was standing on a table. He spoke with a resonant and hearty voice. The most downcast became reassured by this modest, honest, devoted attitude. Suddenly he drew himself up, and looking all that Royalist majority in the face, exclaimed, "Yes, I accept the charge you offer me. I accept the charge of defending the Republic! Nothing but the Republic! Do you perfectly understand?"

A unanimous shout answered him. "Long live the Republic!"

"Ah!" said Beslay, "the voice comes back to you as on the Fourth of May."

"Long live the Republic! Nothing but the Republic!" repeated the men of the Right, Oudinot louder than the others. All arms were stretched towards Tamisier, every hand pressed his. Oh Danger! irresistible converter! In his last hour the Atheist invokes God, and the Royalist the Republic. They cling to that which they have repudiated.

The official historians of the coup d'etat have stated that at the beginning of the sitting two Representatives had been sent by the Assembly to the Ministry of the Interior to "negotiate." What is certain is that these two Representatives had no authority. They presented themselves, not on behalf of the Assembly, but in their own name. They offered themselves as intermediaries to procure a peaceable termination of the catastrophe which had begun. With an honesty which bordered on simplicity they summoned Morny to yield himself a prisoner, and to return within the law, declaring that in case of refusal the Assembly would do its duty, and call the people to the defence of the Constitution and of the Republic. Marny answered them with a smile, accompanied by these plain words, "If you appeal to arms, and if I find any Representatives on the barricades, I will have them all shot to the last man."

The meeting in the Tenth Arrondissement yielded to force. President Vitet insisted that they should forcibly arrest him. A police agent who seized him turned pale and trembled. In certain circumstances, to lay violent hands upon a man is to lay them upon Right, and those who dare to do so are made to tremble by outraged Law. The exodus from the Mairie was long and beset with obstructions. Half-an-hour elapsed while the soldiers were forming a line, and while the Commissaries of Police, all the time appearing solely occupied with the care of driving back the crowd in the street, sent for orders to the Ministry of the Interior. During that time some of the Representatives, seated round a table in the great Hall, wrote to their families, to their wives, to their friends. They snatched up the last leaves of paper; the pens failed; M. de Luynes wrote to his wife a letter in pencil. There were no wafers; they were forced to send the letters unsealed; some soldiers offered to post them. M. Chambolle's son, who had accompanied his father thus far, undertook to take the letters addressed to Mesdames de Luynes, de Lasteyrie, and Duvergier de Hauranne. General Forey—the same who had refused a battalion to the President of the Constituent Assembly, Marrast, who had promoted him from a colonel to a general—General Forey, in the centre of the courtyard of the Mairie, his face inflamed, half drunk, coming out, they said, from breakfast at the Elysee, superintended the outrage. A member, whose name we regret we do not know, dipped his boot into the gutter and wiped it along the gold stripe of the regimental trousers of General Forey. Representative Lherbette came up to General Forey, and said to him, "General, you are a coward." Then turning to his colleagues, he exclaimed, "Do you hear? I tell this general that he is a coward." General Forey did not stir. He kept the mud on his uniform and the epithet on his cheek.

The meeting did not call the people to arms. We have just explained that it was not strong enough to do so; nevertheless, at the last moment, a member of the Left, Latrade, made a fresh effort. He took M. Berryer aside, and said to him, "Our official measures of resistance have come to an end; let us not allow ourselves now to be arrested. Let us disperse throughout the streets crying, 'To arms!'" M. Berryer consulted a few seconds on the matter with the Vice-President, M. Benoist d'Azy, who refused.

The Deputy Mayor, hat in hand, reconducted the members of the Assembly as far as the gate of the Mairie. As soon as they appeared in the courtyard ready to go out between two lines of soldiers, the post of National Guards presented arms, acid shouted, "Long live the Assembly! Long live the Representatives of the People!" The National Guards were at once disarmed, almost forcibly, by the Chasseurs de Vincennes.

There was a wine-shop opposite the Mairie. As soon as the great folding gates of the Mairie opened, and the Assembly appeared in the street, led by General Forey on horseback, and having at its head the Vice-President Vitet, grasped by the necktie by a police agent, a few men in white blouses, gathered at the windows of this wine-shop, clapped their hands and shouted, "Well done! down with the 'twenty-five francs!'"[7]

They set forth.

The Chasseurs de Vincennes, who marched in a double line on each side of the prisoners, cast at them looks of hatred. General Oudinot said in a whisper, "These little infantry soldiers are terrible fellows. At the siege of Rome they flung themselves at the assault like madmen. These lads are very devils." The officers avoided the gaze of the Representatives. On leaving the Mairie, M. de Coislin passed by an officer and exclaimed, "What a disgrace for the uniform!" the officer retaliated with angry words, and incensed M. de Coislin. Shortly afterwards, during the march, he came up to M. de Coislin and said to him, "Sir, I have reflected; it is I who am wrong."

They proceeded on the way slowly. At a few steps from the Mairie the precession met M. Chegaray. The Representatives called out to him, "Come!" He answered, while making an expressive gesture with his hands and his shoulders, "Oh! I dare say! As they have not arrested me...." and he feigned as though he would pass on. He was ashamed, however, and went with them. His name is found in the list of the roll-call at the barracks.

A little further on M. de Lesperut passed them. They cried out to him. "Lesperut! Lesperut!" "I am with you," answered he. The soldiers pushed him back. He seized the butt-ends of the muskets, and forced his way into the column.

In one of the streets through which they went a window was opened. Suddenly a woman appeared with a child; the child, recognizing its father amongst the prisoners, held out its arms and called to him, the mother wept in the background.

It was at first intended to take the Assembly in a body straight to Mazas, but this was counter-ordered by the Ministry of the Interior. It was feared that this long walk, in broad daylight, through populous and easily aroused streets, might prove dangerous; the D'Orsay barracks were close at hand. They selected these as a temporary prison.

One of the commanders insolently pointed out with his sword the arrested Representatives to the passers-by, and said in a fond voice, "These are the Whites, we have orders to spare them. Now it is the turn of the Red Representatives, let them look out for themselves!"

Wherever the procession passed, the populace shouted from the pavements, at the doors, at the windows, "Long live the National Assembly!" When they perceived a few Representatives of the Left sprinkled in the column they cried, "Vive la Republique!" "Vive la Constitution!" and "Vive la Loi!" The shops were not shut, and passers-by went to and fro. Some people said, "Wait until the evening; this is not the end of it."

A staff-officer on horseback, in full uniform, met the procession, recognized M. de Vatimesnil, and came up to greet him. In the Rue de Beaune, as they passed the house of the Democratic Pacifique a group shouted, "Down with the Traitor of the Elysee!"

On the Quai d'Orsay, the shouting was redoubled. There was a great crowd there. On either side of the quay a file of soldiers of the Line, elbow to elbow, kept back the spectators. In the middle of the space left vacant, the members of the Assembly slowly advanced between a double file of soldiers, the one stationary, which threatened the people, the other on the march, which threatened tire Representatives.

Serious reflections arise in the presence of all the details of the great crime which this book is designed to relate. Every honest man who sets himself face to face with the coup d'etat of Louis Bonaparte hears nothing but a tumult of indignant thoughts in his conscience. Whoever reads our work to the end will assuredly not credit us with the intention of extenuating this monstrous deed. Nevertheless, as the deep logic of actions ought always to be italicized by the historian, it is necessary here to call to mind and to repeat, even to satiety, that apart from the members of the Left, of whom a very small number were present, and whom we have mentioned by name, the three hundred Representatives who thus defiled before the eyes of the crowd, constituted the old Royalists and reactionary majority of the Assembly. If it were possible to forget, that—whatever were their errors, whatever were their faults, and, we venture to add, whatever were their illusions—these persons thus treated were the Representatives of the leading civilized nation, were sovereign Legislators, senators of the people, inviolable Deputies, and sacred by the great law of Democracy, and that in the same manner as each man bears in himself something of the mind of God, so each of these nominees of universal suffrage bore something of the soul of France; if it were possible to forget this for a moment, it assuredly would be a spectacle perhaps more laughable than sad, and certainly more philosophical than lamentable to see, on this December morning, after so many laws of repression, after so many exceptional measures, after so many votes of censure and of the state of siege, after so many refusals of amnesty, after so many affronts to equity, to justice, to the human conscience, to the public good faith, to right, after so many favors to the police, after so many smiles bestowed on absolution, the entire Party of Order arrested in a body and taken to prison by the sergents de ville!