Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1886-03-26

/
colonies of France. Mounted on horse
back, we rode daily along the lines of the
commune forces, which at t.eir max
imum, reached as high as 200, 600 men,
! and were constantly under fire during the
day time, watching the slow progress of
/ the troops of MacMahon advancing by
barricade toward the ramparts, with the
aid of seige guns and the other expedi-
ents of approach toward walled city.
During this kind of activity life in Paris
was not without its charms The April
and May weather was delightful in the
city, and the bouevards and cafes were
sufficiently deserted to give an air of
nove'ty to the lightest hearted people in
Europe.
1t is mistake to suppose that the
general life of the city was disorderly
during the reign of the communal body.
In fact their ephemeral a. subsequently
bloody council did some very curioss
things. 1t shut up by stem decree all
dram-shops. Gambling was an aristo-
cratic crime, subiecting the offender to
! Imprisonment, while spelling was de-
clared ba1ge of the privileged orders
and hence relegated to the old notions OF
the past. Everybody could spell as they
might choose, and it is a curious fact
that, while the French academy was dis.
cussing the question whether the word
'hypothenuse'' should be spelled with
or without the "h" the decree abolish
ing spelling'was bn)letined at the Hotel de
Vile War and promoters of war were
to be considered as ass lssins and outlaws,
and ut the very moment when this was
announced as the law of Paris, the body
! of Legislators promulgating it were de-
monding money from the bank of France
and the leading railway corporations
centreing in Paris wherewith to
purchase munition, pay their SOL
diers thirty cents day and
otherwise defray the expenses of their
civil and military carnage. During this
period MacGahan and myself were
quartered in the Place Vendome, with
our horses and messengers, and daily
appeared publicly on horseback or in the
cafes with prominent leaders of the re-
volt, and thus, of course, became marked
men by the mouchards of the regular
government. 1t was part of our business
to be friendly with them, and many
fine breakfast did | have with Bergeret
and his wife and family in the Palais de
Bourbon, in the very salon, too, that was
previously reserved for the kings, en-
perors and presidents of France; and
suspect it would have been harder fate
for me if it were known subsequently,
when arrested, how much of the rare cd
imperial vntages we despoied at the
matutinal feasts, when we drank, of
cour ;e, to the succes of our hosts, with
howsoeyer a hypocritcal smile. After
the long and bitter struggle which the
Commune made to retain possession of
the city, the Versailles or regular army
of MacMahon entered by the Porte
Maillot on the morning Of the 22d of
May, this gate having been betrayed by
a treacherous Communist for immunity
and the gift of 500, 900 francs. Thence
forth and until the 1st of June, when a
state of peace was proclaimed and posted
on the walls of Paris, announcing the
triumph of the regular troops, there
transpired the bloodiest week in the his
tory of the city since the days when
Caesar was there with his Roman legions.
On the morning of the 23d, all of the
important palaces and public buildings
were fired by decree of the committee of
public safety; the archbishop and sixty
and more priests were summarily shot as
hostages in the prison yard of La Ro-
quette, and it seemed as if that imperial
and beautiful capital would burn down to
an utter ruin. Explosions were of mo-
mentary occurrence; the cutters were lit
orally running with blood, and in all of
the great and celebrated quarters of Paris,
! corpses ard wounded were lying as they
fell In the midst Of this carnage the
bombardment was fierce, and monument
al buildings, like the Tuileries, the Lou
vre, the Madeleine and the Trirmphal
Arch were being bruised and battered,
while the facadas of historical structures
were falling amid flame and smoke. Such
wildness, devastation and destruction
were never surpassed. 1t was at this mo-
ment, and while MacGahan and I were
seated at dinner in an American pension
in the Rue Coumartin, that troop of SOL
diers entered the dining-room and rude
| ly seized us, together with two American
ladies who were under our protection and
told us we were under arrest for being
implicated with the communal leaders,
for firing on the troops and in many
ways aiding and abetting the insurec-
tiOn. Both of us had on our persons a
score or more of communal and bloody
passes signed by such chiefs as Bergeret
Cluseret, Dombrowski, Delacldze, Ro Ssel
and Raoul Rigalut, the prince of fiends
| of the entire revolt By n clever eX-
pedient we managed to leave these
| behind us; otherwise we would have
been shot in the street below, as the
order was to Ike no prisoners, whatever,
their nationality, whose concern in the
commune was unmistakable, and to this
| line of conduct the invaders ruthlesSly
adhered, and many an innocent soiourner
in Paris was shot down and carted off to
a nameless grave, doubtless, to be num-
bared among his friends as missing"
Fro n the dining-room we were closely
guarded to the streets below, with the
ladies', who were numbered as Cocoon
spirators, and thus while surrounded by
fixed bayonets pricking our very skins,
and with bare heads, and followed by a
bowling mob crying for our blood, we
were marched to the Boulevard, where the
'owd, augmented to thousands, the wild
whoop for revenge increasing at every
step. 1t was a curious part of the ex-
perience on our way to the military head
quarters of General Vinois, the governor
of Paris, that the very shopkeepers res
tmrateurs, barber and newspaper venders
of whom we had been liberal patrons