New Year’s Day in Paris in 1858

Excerpts from: ASPECTS OF PARIS. BY EDWARD COPPING. LONDON: LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, LONGMANS, & ROBERTS. 1858.

CHAP. II. PARIS ON NEW YEAR'S DAY. IF you would see Paris under its gayest aspect, you must see it on the Jour de l'An, or New Year's Day. The Jour de l'An is the most popular of all French holidays; it is the Christmas Day of France. Paris is lively enough on other festivals, but on this she becomes thoroughly gay. Work almost entirely ceases. The ouvrier puts aside his implements; the ouvrière lays down her needle; the clerk flings away his pen; the merchant closes his ledger; the journalist shuts up his bureau; the judge doffs his gown. The unhappy shopman alone has no respite from labour. Rarely, indeed, does he work so hard as on the Jour de l’An. No wonder! All Paris goes out shopping to-day, and he has all Paris to serve. By noon the great movement has fairly begun. Promenading purchasers fill every street; the arcades overflow; the Boulevards are entirely submerged. From the Madeleine to the Château d'Eau, and from the Château d'Eau to the Madeleine, four goodly miles, I trow, the pavements on both sides are occupied by a slowly moving mass of human forms. It is impossible, be assured, to move quickly. Your pace must necessarily be that of the tortoise. Never mind! The hare is fast asleep to-day. You need not fear that he will outstrip you. If the pavement were not doubly encumbered, you would find it impossible to accelerate your speed. Though you should have no more taste than a Hottentot, no more poetry than a paviour, you must stop to gaze at the glittering objects displayed in every shop window. And yet to loiter here is perilous. Your gold pieces are in danger. If you would return with an unlightened purse and an untroubled conscience, retire at once. There is a conspiracy to-day among the Paris shopkeepers to rifle and strip you. Refuse to listen to the voice of prudence, and they will leave you as coinless as was poor Jean-Jacques when he arrived in Turin under the conduct of the worthy Sabrans. If, however, you are determined after this warning to brave the dangers of the Boulevards, your expenditure be upon your own balance sheet! Follow me. Did you ever before see such a display of charming objects, so calculated to decoy artless woman and seduce unsuspecting man? Every tradesman seems to have opened a fancy fair. See! the linen draper puts forth his most ethereal gauzes, his most glossy satins, his most tender velvets. The tobacconist displays the most gorgeous hookahs, the most magnificent meerschaums, the most fanciful pouches, the richest and rarest snuff-boxes. The bookseller is all a-blaze with brilliant bindings. Nothing but resplendent gift books, gilt edged, gilt lettered, and gilt covered, are to be seen on his counters. Even Corneille and Racine would be excluded from this company of well-dressed tomes if they made their appearance in paper dishabille. Then the china-merchant arranges in the most enticing order his choicest porcelain vases, his most glittering cut glass, his most alluring cups and seductive saucers. A man might contentedly leave off tea-drinking forever, if he could but for once sip his souchong out of this ravishing crockery. And then the stationer, where has he obtained all those ink-stands, which of themselves might tempt any man to rush into print; and those piles of fancy note paper, as delicately tinted as a maiden's cheek; and those writing-cases, which seem almost too delicate for even the hand of Beauty to rest upon? Where, indeed! The toy-man might tell us, perhaps, for evidently he has credit at the same establishment. Yet, no! His merry-eyed, rosy- cheeked dolls, were never made by mortal hands. They must have been born of other dolls, some good old lady from fairyland assisting them into life. It is all clear enough now. Every Paris tradesman has fallen madly in love to-day in love with extravagant display. Why even the apothecary adorns his windows with the most attractive patent medicines and the most pleasing surgical instruments. If there were an undertaker here about, depend upon it he would share the general infatuation. He would treat us to rows and rows of charming little baby- coffins of polished oak, intermingled with the choicest specimens of leaden ware for adults. But the most brilliant displays we have yet to see. Yes! hitherto we have been merely dazzled; now we are to be fairly blinded. A man may look at linen drapers, stationers, china merchants, book-sellers, tobacconists, and pass on unscathed, perhaps; but not thus will he pass the shop where knick knack nothings are sold or that where sweetmeats make mute appeals to the greedy stomach of youth. Knick knack nothings! Imagine the indignation of a polished Paris tradesman upon hearing his objets d’art thus contemptuously designated. I retract the expression. We should have a better name for all these beautiful trifles in which art strives to unite itself to utility these taper stands, toilette boxes, jewel boxes, wafer boxes, scent bottles, clock cases, pin receptacles, &c. Granted, that art is sometimes here put to mean employ, as Minerva would be if she were to go out charring. Yet see how it refines and softens everything it touches! Look at that stand for taper and lucifer matches in the centre a little boy and girl are reading a book; they evidently read by the light of the taper; should it go out are not the matches all ready on the other side to rekindle it? Fortunate age! In our forefathers' days art remained shut up in the picture gallery or the sculpture museum a proud beauty who scorned the vulgar gaze. Now she condescendingly puts on a homely mien and comes forth into our humblest dwellings, bringing brightness into their most obscure corners. But at last we have arrived at the most splendid stall in the fair. We are at the sweetmeat shop of which I spoke. This a sweetmeat shop! Why it's the last scene of a pantomime without the coloured fires! a Bower of Beauty, Hall of Radiant Light or Palace of Dazzling Splendour. Where is the good spirit who ought to be somewhere near about waiting to come in on her magic car? The good spirit, my gentle and simple sir, is behind the counter, quite ready to serve you, if you wish to buy anything, but in no mood to listen to your theatrical rhapsodies. Buy! who talks of buying here? This is an art exhibition not a lollypop shop. Those bonbons are too exquisite to be eaten. I should as soon think of eating the Venus de Milo or the Diane Chasseresse. Eyes, not stomachs, surely, are to be feasted with these beautiful coings, these charming abricots, these graceful cerises; these delicate mandarines, mirabelles, Reines Claudes, brochettes, marrons glacés, angéliques, pastèques, and calissons d'Aix! Why! look at the boxes and baskets in which they are contained. They would grace the boudoir of a fairy. A fairy! If Titania were to come here shopping, Oberon would be forced to disclaim all responsibility for her debts in order to save himself from the Bankruptcy Court or Clichy. Come away, man, come away, while yet another six-pence is left in your pocket. Shops, more shops! Yes, the very pavements axe covered with them. All along the main Boulevards and in many of the chief thoroughfares you will see line after line of temporary shops stretching away. They are mere stalls unsightly edifices of rough deal, hastily knocked together, but they add amazingly to the bustle of the streets. Their proprietors are mostly small tradesmen or hucksters, who are allowed by the municipal authorities, in accordance with time-honoured custom, to establish themselves in this manner upon the public pavement for about a week before, and a week after, the Jour de l’An. Purchasers whose purses will not enable them to visit in safety the shops we have just been looking at come, without fear, to these temporary establishments, for the objects they sell are of inferior quality and of low price. In these stalls there is a strange succession of the useful and the ornamental. In one you will see, perhaps, devotional images; in the next, fleecy hosiery. Side by side with illustrated gift books, you will find cheap fire-irons; immediately after porcelain vases come brushes and brooms. You may buy almost anything, indeed, in these wooden marts. The dealers are prepared to supply every want. Toys, trinkets, sham jewellery, drapery goods, stationery, fruit, bonbons, pictures, cakes, pocket-handkerchiefs, crockery, cutlery, bronzes, cravats, thermometers, purses, walking-sticks, stereoscopes, papier-maché tea-trays, hat-pegs, book-cases, chairs, hair-brushes, telescopes, pots and pans, almanacs, pipes, basket-work, artificial flowers, plaster casts, furs, stags' horns, measurement rules, Berlin wool patterns; all may be had in these street storehouses. How much per cent, under prime cost none but an advertiser would be bold enough to state. But why all this unusual display, you ask, after passing miles of stall and shop, miles of shop and stall? To answer is not difficult. The Jour de l’An is a day on which everybody in France makes presents. As poor as a pauper, or as stingy as charity must be the man who does not open his purse strings on this joyous first of January. Be his circle of acquaintance ever so small, he cannot pass round it without the aid of his generosity. Presents are made to everybody to-day. Presents to mothers, to fathers, to sisters, to brothers, to wives, to daughters, to sons, to cousins, to uncles, to aunts, to nieces, to sweethearts, to mere friends and acquaintances. Ladies and children come in, of course, for the lion's share. If you are on intimate terms with a family, not only the younger members of that family, but their mammas also, expect new year's gifts, or étrennes as they are called. The cost you will be put to, for these presents, is no trifle. A young man of but moderate means, and with but a moderate number of friends, rarely spends less than a hundred francs four pounds sterling upon his étrennes. People whose means are more ample, will disburse ten times that sum. The amount spent every year in Paris on the Jour de l’An for toys alone, is estimated at one hundred and eighty thousand pounds sterling! The étrennes of the superior shops are, as a rule, of the most expensive kind. A box of sweetmeats seems a very simple affair, and so it is when the box is mere deal, and the sweetmeats homely caraway comfits. But this simplicity would not suit Parisian taste. The bonbons of the Jour de l'An are of the most luscious kind; the boxes, elaborately worked and adorned, are of papier-maché, mother of pearl, or carved wood. I have seen them as high as twelve hundred francs -- forty-eight pounds sterling and there are some even dearer. Very pretty presents these, as it seems to me, for New Year's Day. People generally give away these étrennes, or humbler ones of a similar kind, with a cheerful spirit and a smiling face. This is only natural. Friends whom we esteem, and relatives whom we love, have the key of our hearts; and that key, as is well known, unlocks our money-chest. But there are other people who in no way enter into our sympathies, to whom we are as it were compelled to give, and to them we extend our generosity with miserly reluctance.

I have said that the Jour de l'An is the Christmas Day of France. It is the day after as well. A host of persons, who have no more right to ask alms of you than they have to stop you on the highway, assail you now with demands for unearnt money. The weak-voiced, feeble-smiling Auvergnat, who brings you water every morning in pails, after the manner of the middle ages, (such extraordinary inventions as Water Companies and New Rivers not yet having penetrated into the most civilised capital in the world,) is perhaps at the head of this black band. Then comes the charbonnier, who supplies you with wood and coal; the man who brings you your paper in the morning; the servant whom you regularly pay every month for serving you; the blanchisseuse who washes your linen; the concierge who peeps into your letters, and otherwise renders you important aid; the butcher boy who brings you meat; the baker boy who brings you bread; the grocer's boy who brings you grocery. Your entire morning is spent in responding to the pitiful demands of these people. If only sixty or seventy francs also are spent, you may think yourself lucky. In no place are you safe from the banditti of the Jour de l’An. Exhausted, perhaps, by the voluntary acts of generosity which have been wrung from you during the morning, you take refuge in your restaurant, and order a déjeúner. The garҫon smiles upon you as you enter, he smiles upon you as you sit down, he smiles upon you when you have finished your meal. Nay, so amiable has he become, that he brings you, unasked, an orange, which he, still smiling, trusts you will accept. That orange costs you a five franc piece. Your digestion being thus disarranged, you make the best of your way to the café, and take a petit verre, or a little black coffee, exactly of course as you would take a blue pill or a dose of quinine. But here too you meet with a smiling garҫon, who obligingly offers you a cigar tied up with a piece of red ribbon. Your hand is again in your pocket. For cigars cost as much as oranges to-day. As a last resource you fly to your reading-room, hoping to wrap yourself up in a journal, and thus remain concealed. But the surly attendant, who for a whole year has made you wait until six o'clock for the evening papers, and who has always told you that the "Débats" is engaged three deep, at once spies you out, and with a smile even upon his face wishes you all sorts of compliments upon this most auspicious day. You get rid of him with a heavy groan and a gratuity by no means light, and wander forth into the streets, striving to forget your indignation by mingling with the happy groups you see there. You are really forced to give in every direction to-day. If you are not on sufficiently intimate terms with a friend to make him a more expensive present, you send him your card. You leave it at his residence with your own hands, supposing your politeness be strong enough to support you through this act of pedestrianism, and turn down one of its ends to indicate that you have been your own messenger. But if your legs refuse their office, the postman's will be more obliging. To those you can make appeal. There is, in fact, a special postal regulation respecting cards sent through the post-office on the Jour de l’An. If they are enclosed in an open envelope they will be delivered in Paris for five centimes instead of ten, the usual price of a single letter. The number sent in this manner is consequently enormous. The unhappy postman, as may be believed, has no holiday on New Year's Day. Almost from early dawn he is abroad heavily laden with his pack, his pack of cards. How gladly would he let some one else deal them for him this day! We will take one more look at the city ere the day wanes and the early night comes on. It will not be a gloomy night, rest certain; café, cabaret, and restaurant will be filled with a merry company; the shops, even after midnight chimes have sounded, will still be brilliant and bustling as the last labours of the day draw to a close; the pavement will still echo with the tread of many footsteps. And now, while yet an hour or two of lingering light remains, how look the streets? They are still filled with the same crowd that occupied them at noon; the same, except that it is a trifle less numerous. It is even gayer, however, than before. All care, in fact, seems to have fled from Paris to-day. There are no more pouting children; no more frowning wives; no more grumbling husbands; no more melancholy bachelors. Cheerfulness and content sit on every face. Look! the halt, the lame, the blind, and the simply indigent have been allowed to come forth into the streets without let or hinderance, without police interference or restriction, to draw upon the stores of kindly feeling which everywhere abound in Paris to-day. Ordinarily only a certain number of these poor sufferers, duly registered and ticketed, are allowed to appeal for charity on the public way, for even beggary in Paris is a monopoly. To-day, however, the trade is free. Indoors, as well as out of doors, there are gaiety and happiness in Paris. There is a public reception at the Tuileries, and all sorts of étrennes in the shape of honours and promotions will be given to numerous functionaries. There is a private reception in every household. Friends and relatives visit each other who, perhaps, have been separated by distance or social position all the previous year. They would not miss the warm embrace, and the loving words, of the Jour de l’An, for all the good or evil fortunes that might happen during the next twelve months. There will be many a gay party to-night, when the visits of the morning are over and the last present has been made. Many an old dame will forget her years as she looks upon the happy group of sons and grandsons clustering round her. Back to the days so distant, but which seem so near, will she turn once again; back to the days when, light of foot as of heart, she danced 'mid a merry circle, gayest of the gay. Ah! when others dance now, she sits all alone in her chair. But how time changes us! If old age is happy, how much more happy is youth! Look at that glad band of little ones! How proudly they display the beautiful gifts they have received! How they pet and hug the new doll or the new gun which has been given to them! Neither doll nor gun will be safe to-night except beneath their pillows, depend upon it. How lovingly they prattle and play! What fine games they have at colin-maillard, main-chaude, and pigeon vole! And even when sleep has fallen heavily upon their eyes they will still be happy. While yet the fond mother held them so securely in her arms, as they sank into slumber, they had wandered far away far away to scenes where even her watchful love cannot follow them. What would you or I give, oh reader, to have such dreams as they will have to-night? But midnight has sounded. The happy day is over. We must wait another year for another Jour de l’An. Another year! What a sad and a gloomy time we shall pass, perhaps, ere we have crossed the limits of this upon which we have just entered. Courage, courage, faint heart! A day like this will shed its radiance far in advance, and light us over the uncertain road we have to traverse.

An English Christmas in Paris

From: The Illustrated London News, 22 December, 1883. Drawings by A. Forestier.

click to enlarge.

Paris Besieged in 1870

Extracts from: DIARY OF THE BESIEGED RESIDENT IN PARIS. REPRINTED FROM "THE DAILY NEWS," WITH SEVERAL NEW LETTERS AND PREFACE. IN ONE VOLUME. Second Edition, Revised. LONDON: HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS, 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1871. The Right of Translation is Reserved. LONDON: BRADBURY, EVANS, AND CO., PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.

PARIS, September 18th.
No one walking on the Champs Elysées or on the Boulevards to-day would suppose that 300,000 Prussians are within a few miles of the city, and intend to besiege it. Happy, said Laurence Sterne, in his "Sentimental Journey," the nation which can once a week forget its cares. The French have not changed since then. To-day is a fête day, and as a fête day it must be kept. Every one seems to have forgotten the existence of the Prussians. The Cafés are crowded by a gay crowd. On the Boulevard, Monsieur and Madame walk quietly along with their children. In the Champs Elysées honest mechanics and bourgeois are basking in the sun, and nurserymaids are flirting with soldiers. There is even a lull in the universal drilling. The regiments of Nationaux and Mobiles carry large branches of trees stuck into the ends of their muskets. Round the statue of Strasburg there is the usual crowd, and speculators are driving a brisk trade in portraits of General Uhrich. "Here, citizens," cries one, "is the portrait of the heroic defender of Strasburg, only one sou—it cost me two—I only wish that I were rich enough to give it away." "Listen, citizens," cries another, "whilst I declaim the poem of a lady who has escaped from Strasburg. To those who, after hearing it, may wish to read it to their families, I will give it as a favour for two sous." I only saw one disturbance. As I passed by the Rond Point, a very tall woman was mobbed, because it was thought that she might be a Uhlan in disguise. But it was regarded more as a joke than anything serious. So bent on being happy was every one that I really believe that a Uhlan in the midst of them would not have disturbed their equanimity. "Come what may, to-day we will be merry," seemed to be the feeling; "let us leave care to the morrow, and make the most of what may be our last fête day."
Mr. Malet, the English secretary, who returned yesterday from Meaux, had no small difficulty in getting through the Prussian lines. He started on Thursday evening for Creil in a train with a French officer. When they got to Creil, they knocked up the Mayor, and begged him to procure them a horse. He gave them an order for the only one in the town. Its proprietor was in bed, and when they knocked at his door his wife cried out from the window, "My husband is a coward and won't open." A voice from within was heard saying, "I go out at night for no one." So they laid hands on the horse and harnessed it to a gig. All night long they drove in what they supposed was the direction of the Prussian outposts, trumpeting occasionally like elephants in a jungle. In the morning they found themselves in a desert, not a living soul to be seen, so they turned back towards Paris, got close in to the forts, and started in another direction. Occasionally they discerned a distant Uhlan, who rode off when he saw them. On Friday night they slept among the Francs-tireurs, and on the following morning they pushed forward again with an escort. Soon they saw a Prussian outpost, and after waving for some time a white flag, an officer came forward. After a parley Mr. Malet and his friend were allowed to pass. At three o'clock they arrived at Meaux. Count Bismarck was just driving into the town; he at once recognised Mr. Malet, whom he had known in Germany, and begged him to call upon him at nine o'clock. From Mr. Malet I know nothing more. I tried to "interview" him with respect to his conversation with Count Bismarck, but it takes two to make a bargain, and in this bargain he declined to be the number two. About half an hour afterwards, however, I met a foreign diplomatist of my acquaintance who had just come from the British Embassy. He had heard Mr. Malet's story, which, of course, had been communicated to the Corps Diplomatique, and being slightly demoralised, without well thinking what he was doing, he confided it to my sympathising ear.
Mr. Malet, at nine o'clock, found Count Bismarck seated before a table with wine and cigars. He was in high spirits and very sociable. This I can well believe, for I used to know him, and, to give the devil his due, he is one of the few Prussians of a sociable disposition. The interview lasted for more than two hours. Count Bismarck told Mr. Malet that the Prussians meant to have Metz and Strasburg, and should remain in France until they were obtained. The Prussians did not intend to dismantle them, but to make them stronger than they at present are. "The French," he said, "will hate us with an undying hate, and we must take care to render this hate powerless." As for Paris, the German armies would surround it, and with their several corps d'armée, and their 70,000 cavalry, would isolate it from the rest of the world, and leave its inhabitants to "seethe in their own milk." If the Parisians continued after this to hold out, Paris would be bombarded, and, if necessary, burned. My own impression is that Count Bismarck was not such a fool as to say precisely what he intended to do, and that he will attack at once; but the event will prove. He added that Germany was not in want of money, and therefore did not ask for a heavy pecuniary indemnity. Speaking of the French, Count Bismarck observed that there were 200,000 men round Metz, and he believed that Bazaine would have to capitulate within a week. He rendered full justice to the courage with which the army under Bazaine had fought, but he did not seem to have a very high opinion of the French army of Sedan. He questioned Mr. Malet about the state of Paris, and did not seem gratified to hear that there had been no tumults. The declaration of the Republic and its peaceful recognition by Paris and the whole of France appeared by no means to please him. He admitted that if it proved to be a moderate and virtuous Government, it might prove a source of danger to the monarchical principle in Germany.
I do trust that Englishmen will well weigh these utterances. Surely they will at last be of opinion that the English Government should use all its moral influence to prevent a city containing nearly two million inhabitants being burnt to the ground in order that one million Frenchmen should against their will be converted into Germans. It is our policy to make an effort to prevent the dismemberment of France, but the question is not now so much one of policy as of common humanity. No one asks England to go to war for France; all that is asked is that she should recognise the de facto Government of the country, and should urge Prussia to make peace on terms which a French nation can honourably accept.
General Vinoy, out reconnoitering with 15,000 men, came to-day upon a Prussian force of 40,000 near Vincennes. After an artillery combat, he withdrew within the lines of the forts. There have been unimportant skirmishes with the enemy at several points. The American, the Belgian, the Swiss, and the Danish Ministers are still here. Mr. Wodehouse has remained to look after our interests. All the secretaries were anxious to stay. I should be glad to know why Mr. Falconer Atlee, the British Consul at Paris, is not like other consuls, at his post. He withdrew to Dieppe about three weeks ago. His place is here. Neither a consul, nor a soldier, should leave his post as soon as it becomes dangerous.
Victor Hugo has published an address to the nation. You may judge of its essentially practical spirit by the following specimen:—"Rouen, draw thy sword! Lille, take up thy musket! Bordeaux, take up thy gun! Marseilles, sing thy song and be terrible!" I suspect Marseilles may sing her song a long time before the effect of her vocal efforts will in any way prevent the Prussians from carrying out their plans. "A child," say the evening papers, "deposited her doll this afternoon in the arms of the statue of Strasburg. All who saw the youthful patriot perform this touching act were deeply affected."

October 7th.
Paris would hardly be recognised under its present aspect by those citizens of the Far West who are in the habit of regarding it as a place where good Americans go when they die. In the garden of the Tuileries, where bonnes used to flirt with guardsmen, there is an artillery camp. The guns, the pickets of horses, the tents, the camp-fires, and the soldiers in their shirt-sleeves, have a picturesque effect under the great trees. On the Place de la Concorde from morning to evening there is a mob discussing things in general, and watching the regiments as they defile with their crowns before the statue of Strasburg. In the morning the guns of the forts can be heard heavily booming; but the sound has now lost its novelty, and no one pays more attention to it than the miller to the wheel of his mill. In the Champs Elysées there are no private carriages, and few persons sitting on the chairs. The Palais de l'Industrie is the central ambulance; the Cirque de l'Impératrice a barrack. All the cafés chantants are closed. Some few youthful votaries of pleasure still patronise the merry-go-rounds; but the business cannot be a lucrative one. Along the quays by the river side there are cavalry and infantry regiments under tentes d'abri. The Champ de Mars is a camp. In most of the squares there are sheep and oxen. On the outer Boulevards lines of huts have been built for the Mobiles, and similar huts are being erected along the Rue des Remparts for the Nationaux on duty. Everywhere there are squads of Nationaux, some learning the goose-step, others practising skirmishing between the carts and fiacres, others levelling their guns and snapping them off at imaginary Prussians. The omnibuses are crowded; and I fear greatly that their horses will be far from tender when we eat them. The cabbies, once so haughty and insolent, are humble and conciliatory, for Brutus and Scævola have taught them manners, and usually pay their fares in patriotic speeches. At the Arc de Triomphe, at the Trocadero, and at Passy, near the Point du Jour, there are always crowds trying to see the Prussians on the distant hills, and in the Avenue de l'Impératrice (now the Avenue Uhrich), there are always numerous admirers of Mont Valérien gazing silently upon the object of their worship. In the Faubourg St. Antoine workmen are lounging about doing nothing, and watching others drilling. In the outer faubourgs much the same thing goes on, except where barricades are being built. Round each of these there is always a crowd of men and women, apparently expecting the enemy to assault them every moment. At the different gates of the town there are companies of Mobiles and National Guards, who sternly repel every civilian who seeks to get through them. On an average of every ten minutes, no matter where one is, one meets either a battalion of Nationaux or Mobiles, marching somewhere. The asphalt of the boulevards, that sacred ground of dandies and smart dresses, is deserted during the daytime. In the evening for about two hours it is thronged by Nationaux with their wives; Mobiles who ramble along, grinning vaguely, hand in hand, as though they were in their native villages; and loafers. There, and in the principal streets, speculators have taken advantage of the rights of man to stop up the side walks with tables on which their wares are displayed. On some of them there are kepis, on others ointment for corns, on others statuettes of the two inseparables of Berlin, William and his little Bismarck, on others General Trochu and the members of the Government in gilt gingerbread. The street-hawkers are enjoying a perfect carnival—the last editions of the papers—the Tuileries' papers—the caricatures of Badinguet—portraits of the heroic Uhrich, and infallible cures for the small-pox or for worms, are offered for sale by stentorian lungs. Citizens, too, equally bankrupt alike in voice and in purse, place four lighted candles on the pavement, and from the midst of this circle of light dismally croak the "Marseillaise" and other patriotic songs. As for beggars, their name is legion; but as every one who wants food can get it at the public cantines, their piteous whines are disregarded. Lodgings are to be hired in the best streets for about one-tenth part of what was asked for them two months ago, and even that need not be paid. Few shops are shut; but their proprietors sit, hoping against hope, for some customer to appear. The grocers, the butchers, and the bakers, and the military tailors, still make money; but they are denounced for doing so at the clubs as bad patriots. As for the hotels, almost all of them are closed. At the Grand Hotel, there are not twenty persons. Business of every kind is at a standstill. Those who have money, live on it; those who have not, live on the State: the former shrug their shoulders and say, "Provided it does not last;" the latter do not mind how long it lasts. All are comparatively happy in the thought that the eyes of Europe are on them, and that they have already thrown Leonidas and his Spartans into the shade.
The Government has placarded to-day a despatch from Tours. Two armies are already formed, we are told—one at Lyons, and the other at——. The situation of Bazaine is excellent. The provinces are ready. The departments are organising to the cry of "Guerre à outrance, ni un pouce de terrain, ni une pierre de nos forteresses!" I trust that the news is true; but I have an ineradicable distrust of all French official utterances. A partial attempt is being made to relieve the population. At the Mairies of the arrondissements, tickets are delivered to heads of families, giving them the right to a certain portion of meat per diem until January. The restaurants are still fairly supplied; so that the system of rationing is not yet carried out in its integrity.
I am not entirely without hopes that the trial through which France is passing will in the end benefit it. Although we still brag a good deal, there is within the last few days a slight diminution of bluster. Cooped up here, week after week, the population must in the end realise the fact that the world can move on without them, and that twenty years of despotism has enervated them and made other nations their equals, if not their superiors. As Sydney Smith said of Macaulay, they have occasional flashes of silence. They sit, now and then, silent and gloomy, and mourn for the "Pauvre France." "Nous sommes bien tombés." This is a good sign, but will it outlive a single gleam of success? Shall we not in that case have the Gallic cock crowing as lustily as ever? The French have many amiable and engaging qualities, and if adversity would only teach them wisdom, the country is rich enough to rise from the ruin which has overtaken it. M. Jules Simon has published a plan of education which he says in twenty years will produce a race of virile citizens; but this is a little long to wait for a social regeneration. At present they are schoolboys, accustomed to depend on their masters for everything, and the defence of Paris is little more than the "barring out" of a girls' school. They cannot, like Anglo-Saxons, organise themselves, and they have no man at their head of sufficient force of character to impose his will upon them. The existing Government has, it is true, to a certain extent produced administrative order, but they have not succeeded in inspiring confidence in themselves, or in raising the spirit of the Parisians to the level of the situation. The Ultras say justly, that this negative system cannot last, and that prompt action is as much a political as it is a military necessity.
The sixth livraison of the Tuileries papers has just appeared. Its contents are unimportant. There is a receipt from Miss Howard, the Emperor's former mistress, showing that between 1850 and 1855 she received above five million francs. This sum was not, however, a sufficient remuneration in her opinion, for her services, as in July, 1855, she writes for more, and says "the Emperor is too good to leave a woman whom he has tenderly loved in a false position." This and several other of her letters are addressed to the Emperor's Secretary, whose functions seem to have been of a peculiarly domestic character. Indeed, the person who fulfilled them would everywhere, except at a Court, have been called something less euphonious than "secretary." A report from M. Duvergier, ex-Secretary-General of the Police, is published respecting the Cabinet Noir. It is addressed to the then Minister of the Interior. It is lengthy, and very detailed. It appears that occasionally the Emperor's own letters were opened.
I went to the Hôtel de Ville this afternoon, to see whether anything was going on there. Several battalions passed by, but they did not demonstrate en passant. The place was full of groups of what in England would be called the "dangerous classes." They were patiently listening to various orators who were denouncing everything in general, and the Government in particular. The principal question seemed to be that of arms. Frenchmen are so accustomed to expect their Governments to do everything for them, that they cannot understand why, although there were but few Chassepots in the city, every citizen should not be given one. It is indeed necessary to live here and to mix with all classes to realise the fact that the Parisians have until now lived in an ideal world of their own creation. Their orators, their statesmen, and their journalists, have traded upon the traditions of the First Empire, and persuaded them that they are a superior race, and that their superiority is universally recognised. Utterly ignorant of foreign languages and of foreign countries, they believe that their literature is the only one in the world, and that a Frenchman abroad is adored as something little less than a divinity. They regard the Prussians round their city much as the citizens of Sparta would have regarded Helots, and they are so astonished at their reverses, that they are utterly unable to realise what is going on. As for trying to make them comprehend that Paris ought to enjoy no immunity from attack which Berlin or London might not equally claim, it is labour lost. "The neutrals," I heard a member of the late Assembly shouting in a café, "are traitors to civilisation in not coming to the aid of the Queen of Europe." They did their very best, they declare, to prevent Napoleon from making war. Yet one has only to talk with one of them for half an hour to find that he still hankers after the Rhine, and thinks that France wishes to be supreme in Europe.

October 8th.
Yesterday I happened to be calling at the Embassy, when a young English gentleman made his appearance, and quietly asked whether he could take any letters to England. He is to start to-day in a balloon, and has paid 5,000f. for his place. I gave him a letter, and a copy of one which I had confided on Wednesday to an Irishman who is trying to get through the lines. I hear that to-morrow the Columbian Minister is going to the Prussian Headquarters, and a friend of mine assures me that he thinks if I give him a letter by one o'clock to-day this diplomatist will take it. The Corps Diplomatique are excessively indignant with the reply they have received from Count Bismarck, declining to allow any but open despatches through the Prussian lines. They have held an indignation meeting. M. Kern, the Swiss Minister, has drawn up a protest, which has been signed by himself and all his colleagues. The Columbian Minister is to be the bearer of it. It bombards Bismarck with copious extracts from Puffendorf and Grotius, and cites a case in point from the siege of Vienna in the 15th century. It will be remembered that Messenger Johnson, at the risk of his life and at a very great expense to the country, brought despatches to the Parisian Embassy on the second day of the siege. I recommend Mr. Rylands, or some other M.P. of independent character, to insist upon Parliament being informed what these important despatches were. The revelation will be a curious one.

October 19th.
Each person now receives 100 grammes of meat per diem, the system of distribution being that every one has to wait on an average two hours before he receives his meat at the door of a butcher's shop. I dine habitually at a bouillon; there horse-flesh is eaten in the place of beef, and cat is called rabbit. Both, however, are excellent, and the former is a little sweeter than beef, but in other respects much like it; the latter something between rabbit and squirrel, with a flavour all its own. It is delicious. I recommend those who have cats with philoprogenitive proclivities, instead of drowning the kittens, to eat them. Either smothered in onions or in a ragout they are excellent. When I return to London I shall frequently treat myself to one of these domestic animals, and ever feel grateful to Bismarck for having taught me that cat served up for dinner is the right animal in the right place.

October 20th.
"The clients of M. Poiret are informed that they can only have one plate of meat," was the terrible writing which stared me on the wall, when I went to dine at my favourite bouillon—and, good heavens, what a portion it was! Not enough for the dinner of a fine lady who has previously gorged herself at a private luncheon. If meat is, as we are told, so plentiful that it will last for five weeks more, the mode in which it is distributed is radically bad. While at a large popular restaurant, where hundreds of the middle classes dine, each person only gets enough cat or horse to whet his appetite for more; in the expensive cafés on the Boulevards, feasts worthy of Lucullus are still served to those who are ready to part with their money with the proverbial readiness of fools. Far more practical, my worthy Republicans, would it be to establish "liberté, égalité, fraternité" in the cook shops, than to write the words in letters of gold over your churches. In every great city there always is much want and misery; here, although succour is supposed to be afforded to all who require it, many I fear are starving owing to that bureaucrat love of classification which is the curse of France. After my meagre dinner, I was strolling along the quays near the river, l'estomac as leger as M. Ollivier's heart, when I saw a woman leaning over the parapet. She turned as I was passing her, and the lamp from the opposite gate of the Tuileries shone on her face. It was honest and homely, but so careworn, so utterly hopeless, that I stopped to ask her if she was ill. "Only tired and hungry'" she replied; "I have been walking all day, and I have not eaten since yesterday." I took her to a café and gave her some bread and coffee, and then she told me her story. She was a peasant girl from Franche Comté, and had come to Paris, where she had gone into service. But she had soon tired of domestic servitude, and for the last year she had supported herself by sewing waistcoats in a great wholesale establishment. At the commencement of the siege she had been discharged, and for some days she found employment in a Government workshop, but for the last three weeks she had wandered here and there, vainly asking for work. One by one she had sold every article of dress she possessed, except the scanty garments she wore, and she had lived upon bread and celery. The day before she had spent her last sou, and when I saw her she had come down to the river, starving and exhausted, to throw herself into it. "But the water looked so cold, I did not dare," she said. Thus spoke the grisette of Paris, very different from the gay, thoughtless being of French romance, who lives in a garret, her window shrouded with flowers, is adored by a student, and earns enough money in a few hours to pass the rest of the week dancing, gossiping, and amusing herself. As I listened to her, I felt ashamed of myself for repining because I had only had one plate of meat. The hopeless, desolate condition of this poor girl is that of many of her class to-day. But why should they complain? Is not King William the instrument of Heaven, and is he not engaged in a holy cause? That Kings should fight and that seamstresses should weep is in the natural order of things. Frenchmen and Frenchwomen only deserve to be massacred or starved if they are so lost to all sense of what is just as to venture to struggle against the dismemberment of their country, and do not understand how meet and right it is that their fellow-countrymen in Alsace should be converted into German subjects.
November 8th
A new industry has sprung up in Paris. A manufactory has been discovered, in which Prussian casques and sabres were being made. It was at first thought that the owner was engaged in a dark conspiracy, but, upon being arrested, he confessed that he was endeavouring to meet the demand for trophies from the fields of battle. In one room of the house of this ingenious speculator, a large number of forged letters were found, from mothers, sisters, and brides, to their relations in the army before Paris: these, he explained, were to be sold, warranted from the pocket of a German corpse.

January 6th.
The vin ordinaire is giving out. It has already risen nearly 60 per cent. in price. This is a very serious thing for the poor, who not only drink it, but warm it and make with bread a soup out of it. Yesterday, I had a slice of Pollux for dinner. Pollux and his brother Castor are two elephants, which have been killed. It was tough, coarse, and oily, and I do not recommend English families to eat elephant as long as they can get beef or mutton. Many of the restaurants are closed owing to want of fuel. They are recommended to use lamps; but although French cooks can do wonders with very poor materials, when they are called upon to cook an elephant with a spirit lamp the thing is almost beyond their ingenuity. Castor and Pollux's trunks sold for 45fr. a lb.; the other parts of the interesting twins fetched about 10fr. a lb. It is a good deal warmer to-day, and has been thawing in the sun; if the cold and the siege had continued much longer, the Prussians would have found us all in bed. It is a far easier thing to cut down a tree than to make it burn. Proverbs are not always true; and I have found to my bitter experience of late that the proverb that "there is no smoke without a fire" is untrue. The Tupper who made it never tried to burn green wood.

A Trip to Paris in August 1792

Excerpts on events in Paris in August 1792 as observed by an Englishman, Richard Twiss, and recorded in: A TRIP TO PARIS, IN JULY and AUGUST, 1792. LONDON: PRINTED AT THE Minerva Press, AND SOLD BY WILLIAM LANE, LEADENHALL-STREET, AND BY MRS. HARLOW, PALL-MALL. M.DCC.XCIII. PRICE THREE SHILLINGS Entered at Stationers Hall.

EXECUTION OF TWO CRIMINALS, WITH A BEHEADING MACHINE.
ON the 4th of August a criminal was beheaded, in the Place de Grêve. I did not see the execution, because, as the hour is never specified, I might have waited many hours in a crowd, from which there is no extricating one's self. I was there immediately after, and saw the machine, which was just going to be taken away. I went into a coffee-house and made a drawing, which is here engraven. It is called la Guillotine, from the name of the person who first brought it into use in Paris: that at Lisle is called le Louison, for a similar reason. In English it is termed a maiden.
Machines of this kind are at present made use of for executions throughout all France, and criminals are put to death in no other manner.
The following is the account of an execution, which I had from an eye-witness.
The crowd began to assemble at ten in the morning, and waited, exposed to the intense heat of the sun in the middle of July, till four in the afternoon, when the criminals, a Marquis and a Priest, were brought, in two coaches; they were condemned for having forged assignats [paper money].
The Marquis ascended the scaffold first; he was as pale as if he had already been dead, and he endeavoured to hide his face, by pulling his hair over it; there were two executioners, dressed in black, on the scaffold, one of which immediately tied a plank of about 18 inches broad, and an inch thick, to the body of the Marquis, as he stood upright, fastening it about the arms, the belly, and the legs; this plank was about four feet long, and came almost up to his chin; a priest who attended, then applied a crucifix to his mouth, and the two executioners directly laid him on his belly on the bench, lifted up the upper part of the[36] board which was to receive his neck, adjusted his head properly, then shut the board and pulled the string which is fastened to the peg at the top of the machine, which lifted up a latch, and down came the axe; the head was off in a moment, and fell into a basket which was ready to receive it, the executioner took it out and held it up by the hair to show the populace, and then put it into another basket along with the body: very little blood had issued as yet.
The Priest was now taken out of the coach, from which he might have seen his companion suffer; the bloody axe was hoisted up and he underwent the same operation exactly. Each of these executions lasted about a minute in all, from the moment of the criminal's ascending the scaffold to that of the body's being taken away. It was now seen that the body of the Marquis made such a violent expiration that the belly raised the lid of the basket it was in, and the blood rushed out of the great arteries in torrents.
The windows of the Place de Grêve were, as usual on such occasions, filled with ladies. Many persons were performing on violins, and trumpets, in order to pass the time away, and to relieve the tediousness of expectation.
* * *
I went once to Versailles; there is hardly any thing in the palace but the bare walls, a very few of the looking-glasses, tapestry, and large pictures remaining, as it has now been near two years uninhabited. I crossed the great canal on foot; there was not a drop of water in it.
In the Menagerie I saw the Rhinoceros, which has been 23 years there; there is likewise a lion, with a little dog in the same den, as his companion, and a zebra.
The collection of orange trees cannot be matched in any country where these trees do not grow naturally; the number is about six hundred, the largest trunk is about fifteen inches in diameter, and the age of the most ancient of these trees exceeds three centuries.
* * *
LION Dogs and Cats are common in Paris.
The lion-dog greatly resembles a lion in miniature; the hair of the fore part of its body is long, and curled, and the hinder part short; the nose is short, and the tail is long and tufted at the extremity; the smallest are little larger than guinea-pigs; these are natives of Malta, and are the most valuable; those which are produced in France are considerably larger, and the breed degenerates very soon. Their general colour is white; they are frequently called Lexicons, which word is derived, not from a dictionary, but from a French compound word of nearly the same sound, descriptive of one of their properties.
The lion-cat comes originally from Angora, in Syria. It is much larger than the common[51] cat; its hair is very long, especially about the neck, where it forms a fine ruff, of a silvery whiteness and silky texture, that on the tail is three or four inches long; these cats frequently spread their tails on their backs, as squirrels do. The colour is generally white, but sometimes light brown; they do not catch mice. This beautiful species does not degenerate speedily, and it appears to thrive better in Paris than in any other part of Europe. The figures of both these animals are in Buffon's Natural History.
About the Palais Royal persons are frequently found who offer for sale white mice in cages; these are pretty little animals, their fur is snow white, and their eyes are red and sparkling. Other persons carried for sale canary-birds, linnets, and two or three other sorts of small birds, perched on their fingers; these birds had been rendered so tame that they did not attempt to fly away.
* * *
There is a school at the point of the isle of St. Louis, in the river Seine, to teach swimming; persons who chuse to learn in private pay four louis, those who swim among others, half that sum, or half-crown a lesson; if they are not perfect in that art in a season, (five summer months) they may attend the following season gratis.
* * *
THE common people are in general much better clothed than they were before the Revolution, which may be ascribed to their not being so grievously taxed as they were. An English Gentleman who has gone for many years annually from Calais to Paris, remarks, that they are almost as well dressed on working days at present, as they were on Sundays and holidays formerly.
All those ornaments which three years ago were worn of silver, are now of gold. All the women of the lower class, even those who sit behind green-stalls, &c. wear gold ear-rings, with large drops, some of which cost two or three louis, and necklaces of the same. Many of the men wear plain gold ear-rings; those worn by officers and other gentlemen are usually as large as a half-crown piece. Even children of two years old have small gold drops in their ears. The general dress of the women is white linen or muslin gowns, large caps which cover all their hair, excepting just a small triangular piece over the forehead, pomatumed, or rather plaistered and powdered, without any hats: neither do they wear any stays, but only corsets (waistcoats or jumps.) Tight lacing is not known here, nor yet high and narrow heeled shoes. Because many of the ladies ci-devant of quality have emigrated or ran away, and that those which remain in Paris, keep within doors, I saw no face that was painted, excepting on the stage. Most of the men wear coats made like great-coats, or in other words, long great-coats, without any coat: this in fine weather and in the middle of summer made them appear to me like invalides. There is hardly any possibility of distinguishing the rank of either man or woman by their dress at present, or rather, there are no ranks to distinguish.
The nation in general is much improved in cleanliness, and even in politeness. The French no longer look on every Englishman as a lord, but as their equal.
* * *
BATTLE AND MASSACRE AT THE TUILERIES.
ON Thursday, the 9th of August, the legislative body completed the general discontent of the people, (which had been raised the preceding day, by the discharge of every accusation against la Fayette) by appearing to protract the question relative to the king's déchéance (forfeiture) at a time when there was not a moment to lose, and by not holding any assembly in the evening.
The fermentation increased every minute, in a very alarming manner. The mayor himself had declared to the representatives of the nation, that he could not answer for the tranquillity of the city after midnight. Every body knew that the people intended at that hour to ring the alarm-bell; and to go to the château of the Tuileries, as it was suspected that the Royal Family intended to escape to Rouen, and it is said many trunks were found, packed up and ready for taking away, and that many carriages were seen that afternoon in the court-yard of the Tuileries.
At eight in the evening the generale,(a sort of beat of drum) was heard in all the sections, the tocsin was likewise rung, (an alarm, by pulling the bells of the churches, so as to cause the clappers to give redoubled strokes in very quick time. Some bells were struck with large hammers.)
All the shops were shut, and also most of the great gates of the hotels; lights were placed in almost every window, and few of the inhabitants retired to their repose: the night passed however without any other disturbance; many of the members of the National Assembly were sitting soon after midnight, and the others were expected. Mr. Petion, the mayor, had been sent for by the king, and was then in the château; the number of members necessary to form a sitting, being completed, the tribunes (galleries) demanded and obtained a decree to oblige the château to release its prey, the mayor; he soon after appeared at the bar, and from thence went to the commune (mansion-house.)
It was now about six o'clock on Friday morning (10th) the people of the fauxbourgs (suburbs) especially of St. Antoine and St. Marcel, which are parted by the river, assembled together on the Place de la Bastille, and the crowd was so great that twenty-five persons were squeezed to death. At seven the streets were filled with-armed citizens, that is to say, with federates (select persons sent from the provinces to assist at the Federation, or confederacy held last July 14) from Marseille, from Bretagne, with national guards, and Parisian sans-culottes, (without breeches, these people have breeches, but this is the name which has been given to the mob.) The arms consisted of guns, with or without bayonets, pistols, sabres, swords, pikes, knives, scythes, saws, iron crows, wooden billets, in short of every thing that could be used offensively.
A party of these met a false patrol of twenty-two men, who, of course, did not know the watch-word. These were instantaneously put to death, their heads cut off and carried about the streets on pikes (on promena leurs têtes sur des piques.) This happened in la Place Vendôme; their bodies were still lying there the next day. Another false patrol, consisting of between two and three hundred men, with cannon, wandered all night in the neighbourhood of the theatre français: it is said they were to join a detachment from the battalion of Henri IV. on the Pont-neuf, to cut the throats of Petion and the Marseillois, who were encamped on the Pont St. Michel (the next bridge to the Pont-neuf) which caused the then acting parish assemblies to order an honorary guard of 400 citizens, who were to be answerable for the liberty and the life of that magistrate, then in the council-chamber. Mandat, commander-general of the National Guard, had affronted M. Petion, when he came from the château of the Tuileries, to go to the National Assembly; he was arrested and sent to prison immediately.
The insurrection now became general; the Place du Carrousel (square of the Carousals, a square in the Tuileries, so called from the magnificent festival which Lewis XIV. in 1662, there gave to the queen and the queen-mother) was already filled; the king had not been in bed; all the night had probably been spent in combining a plan of defence, if attacked, or rather of retreat; soon after seven the king, the queen, their two children (the dauphin, seven years old, and his sister fourteen) Princess Elizabeth, (the queen's sister, about 50 years old) and the Princess de Lamballe, crossed the garden of the Tuileries, which was still shut, escorted by the National Guard, and by all the Swiss, and took refuge in the National Assembly, when the Swiss returned to their posts in the château.
The alarm-bells, which were incessantly ringing, the accounts of the carrying heads upon pikes, and of the march of almost all Paris in arms; the presence of the king, throwing himself, as it were, on the mercy of the legislative body; the fierce and determinate looks of the galleries; all these things together had such an effect on the National Assembly, that it immediately decreed the suspension of Lewis XVI. which decree was received with universal applause and clapping.
At this moment a wounded man rushed into the Assembly, crying, "We are betrayed, to arms, to arms, the Swiss are firing on the citizens; they have already killed a hundred Marseillois."
This was about nine o'clock. The democrats, that is to say, the armed citizens, as beforementioned, had dragged several pieces of cannon, six and four pounders, into the carousel square, and were assembled there, on the quais, the bridges, and neighbouring streets, in immense numbers, all armed; they knew the king was gone to the National Assembly, and came to insist on his déchéance (forfeiture) or resignation of the throne. All the Swiss (six or seven hundred) came out to them, and permitted them to enter into the court-yard of the Tuileries, to the number of ten thousand, themselves standing in the middle, and when they were peaceably smoking their pipes and drinking their wine, the Swiss turned back to back, and fired a volley on them, by which about two hundred were killed; the women and children ran immediately into the river, up to their necks, many jumping from the parapets and from the bridges, many were drowned, and many were shot in the water, and on the balustrades of the Pont-royal, from the windows of the gallery of the Louvre.
The populace now became, as it were, mad, they seized on five cannon they found in the court yard, and turned them against the château; they planted some more cannon on the Pont-royal and in the garden, twenty-two pieces in all, and attacked the château on three sides at once. The Swiss continued their fire, and it is said they fired seven times to the people's once; the Swiss had 36 rounds of powder, whereas the people had hardly three or four. Expresses were sent several miles to the powder-mills, for more ammunition, even as far as Essonne, about twenty miles off, on the road to Fontainebleau. The people contrived however to discharge their twenty-two cannon nine or ten times. From nine to twelve the firing was incessant; many waggons and carts were constantly employed in carrying away the dead to a large excavation, formerly a stone quarry, at the back of the new church de la Madeleine de la ville l'Eveque (part of the Fauxbourg St. Honoré, thus called.)
Soon after noon the Swiss had exhausted all their powder, which the populace perceiving, they stormed the château, broke open the doors, and put every person they found to the sword, tumbling the bodies out of the windows into the garden, to the amount, it is supposed, of about two thousand, having lost four thousand on their own side. Among the slain in the château, were, it is asserted, about two hundred noblemen and three bishops: all the furniture was destroyed, the looking-glasses broken, in short, nothing left but the bare walls.
Sixty of the Swiss endeavoured to escape through the gardens, but the horse (gendarmerie nationale) rode round by the street of St. Honoré, and met them full butt at the end of the gardens; the Swiss fired, killed five or six and twenty horses and about thirty men, and were then immediately cut to pieces; the people likewise put the Swiss porters at the pont-tournant (turning bridge) to death, as well as all they could find in the gardens and elsewhere: they then set fire to all the casernes (barracks) in the carousel, and afterwards got at the wine in the cellars of the château, all of which was immediately drank; many citizens were continually bringing into the National Assembly jewels, gold, louis d'ors, plate, and papers, and many thieves were, as soon as discovered, instantly taken to lamp irons and hanged by the ropes which suspend the lamps. This timely severity, it is supposed, saved Paris from an universal pillage. Fifty or sixty Swiss were hurried by the populace to the Place de Grêve, and there cut to pieces.
At about three o'clock in the afternoon every thing was tolerably quiet, and I ventured out for the first time that day.
The quais, the bridges, the gardens, and the immediate scene of battle were covered with bodies, dead, dying, and drunk; many wounded and drunk died in the night; the streets were filled with carts, carrying away the dead, with litters taking the wounded to hospitals; with women and children crying for the loss of their relations, with men, women, and children walking among and striding over the dead bodies, in silence, and with apparent unconcern; with troops of the sans-culottes running about, covered with blood, and carrying, at the end of their bayonets, rags of the clothes which they had torn from the bodies of the dead Swiss, who were left stark naked in the gardens.
One of these sans-culottes was bragging that he had killed eight Swiss with his own hand. Another was observed lying wounded, all over blood, asleep or drunk, with a gun, pistols, a sabre, and a hatchet by him.
The courage and ferocity of the women was this day very conspicuous; the first person that entered the Tuileries, after the firing ceased, was a woman, named Teroigne, she had been very active in the riots at Brussels, a few years ago; she afterwards was in prison a twelvemonth at Vienna, and when she was released, after the death of the Emperor, went to Geneva, which city she was soon obliged to leave; she then came to Paris, and headed the Marseillois; she began by cleaving the head of a Swiss, who solicited her protection, and who was instantaneously cut in pieces by her followers. She is agreeable in her person, which is small, and is about twenty-eight years of age.
Many men, and also many women, as well of the order of Poissardes (which are a class almost of the same species and rank with our fishwomen, and who are easily distinguished by their red cotton bibs and aprons) as others, ran about the gardens, ripping open the bellies, and dashing out the brains of several of the naked dead Swiss.
At six in the evening I saw a troop of national guards and sans-culottes kill a Swiss who was running away, by cleaving his skull with a dozen sabres at once, on the Pont-royal, and then cast him into the river, in less time than it takes to read this, and afterwards walk quietly on.
The shops were shut all this day, and also the theatres; no coaches were about the streets, at least not near the place of carnage; the houses were lighted up, and patroles paraded the streets all night. Not a single house was pillaged.
The barracks were still in flames, as well as the houses of the Swiss porters at the end of the gardens; these last gave light to five or six waggons which were employed all night in carrying away the dead carcases.
THE next day, Saturday the 11th, about an hundred Swiss who had not been in the palace placed themselves under the protection of the National Assembly. They were sent to the Palais Bourbon escorted by the Marseillois, with Mr. Petion at their head, in order to be tried by a court-martial.
The people were now employed, some in hanging thieves, others with Mademoiselle Teroigne on horseback at their head, in pulling down the statues of the French Kings.
* * *
BEHEADING. DEAD NAKED BODIES.
BUT to return to those "active citizens, whom aristocratic insolence has stiled sans-culottes, brigands."
On Sunday, they dragged a man to the Hôtel de Ville, before a magistrate, to be tried, for having stolen something in the Tuileries as they said. He was accordingly tried, searched, and nothing being found on him, was acquitted; n'importe, said these citizens,[91] we must have his head for all that, for we caught him in the act of stealing. They laid him on his back on the ground, and in the presence of the judge, who had acquitted him, they sawed off his head in about a quarter of an hour, with an old notched scythe, and then gave it to the boys to carry about on a pike, leaving the carcase in the justice-hall.
At the corner of almost every chief street is a black marble slab, inserted in the wall about ten feet high, on which is cut in large letters, gilt, Loix et actes de l'autorité publique (laws and acts of the public authority) and underneath are pasted the daily and sometimes hourly decrees and notices of the National Assembly. One of these acquainted the citizens, that Mandat (the former commander-general of the national guards) had yesterday undergone the punishment due to his crimes; that is to say, the people had cut off his head.
During several days, after the day I procured all the Paris newspapers, about twenty, but all on the same side, as the people had put the editors of the aristocratic papers, hors d'état de parler (prevented their speaking) by beheading one or two of them, and destroying all their presses.
They, about this time, hanged two money changers (people who gave paper for louis d'or, crowns, and guineas) under the idea that the money was sent to the emigrants.
On the Saturday morning, at seven, I was in the Tuileries gardens; only thirty-eight dead naked bodies were still lying there; they were however covered where decency required; the people who stript them on the preceding evening, having cut a gash in the belly, and left a bit of the shirt sticking to the carcase by means of the dried blood. I was told, that the body of a lady had just been carried out of the Carousel square; she was the only woman killed, and that probably by accident. Here I had the pleasure of seeing many beautiful ladies (and ugly ones too as I thought) walking arm in arm with their male friends, though so early in the morning, and forming little groups, occupied in contemplating the mangled naked and stiff carcases.
* * *
Here an officer of the national guard who had been present during the whole of the battle of the 10th, said to me, "La journeé a eté un peu forte, nous avons eu plus de quinze cens des notres de tués," (the day was rather warm; we have had more than fifteen hundred of our own people killed.) This was confirmed by many more of the officers there, with whom I had a quarter of an hour's conversation, and they all estimated the number of the slain at above six thousand, which may probably be accounted for in the following manner, but a demonstration is impossible.
Some assert that there were eight hundred Swiss soldiers in the château of the Tuileries; others but five hundred: let us take the medium of six hundred and fifty. They had, as every one allows, six and thirty charges each, and they fired till their ammunition was expended. This makes above three and twenty thousand shot, every one of which must have taken place, on a mob as thick as hailstones after a shower: but allowing for the Swiss themselves, who were killed during the engagement, which diminishes the number of shot, and then allowing likewise, that of two thousand persons who were in the palace, we here say nothing of the remaining thirteen or fourteen hundred, most of whom were firing as well as they could, perhaps it may not appear exaggerated to say, that out of above twenty thousand shot, four thousand must have taken place mortally; and this includes the fifteen hundred of the national guard, which were certainly known to be missing. Of the other two thousand five hundred slain, the number could not so correctly be ascertained, as they consisted of citizens without regimentals or uniform, and of sans-culottes, none of whom were registered. All the persons in the palace were killed; of these, few, if any, were taken away immediately, whereas when any of the adverse party were killed, there were people enough who were glad of the opportunity of escaping from this slaughter, by carrying away the corpse. We must then reflect on the number of waggons and carts employed all night in the same offices, and then we shall see great reason to double the number of the slain, as has been done in various publications.
No idea of this number could be formed by seeing the field of battle, because several bodies were there lying in heaps, and of the others not above two or three could be seen at a time, as the streets were after the engagement filled with spectators, who walked among and over the carcases.
Of the feelings of these spectators, I judge by my own: I might perhaps have disliked seeing a single dead body, but the great number immediately reconciled me to the sight.