chemist was shot dead. Scores of similar
incidents took place on that dreadful Thursday
afternoon. Friends, acquaintances, of my
own, had friends, neighbours, relations,
servants, killed. Yet it was all accident, chance-
medley—excusable, of course. How were the
soldiers to distinguish between insurgents and
sight-seers? These murders were, after all,
but a few of the thorns to be found in the rose-
bush of glorious war!

From the street which in old Paris times
used to go by the name of the Rue Royale,
and which I know by the token that there is
an English pastry-cook's on the right-hand
side, coming down; where in old days I used
(a small lad then at the Collège Bourbon)
to spend my half-holidays in consuming real
English cheesecakes, and thinking of home:
— in the Rue Royale, now called, I think, Rue
de la République; I walked on to the place, and
by the Boulevard de la Madeleine, des Italiens,
and so by the long line of that magnificent
thoroughfare, to within a few streets of  the
Porte St. Denis. Here, I stopped, for the
simple reason, that a hedge of soldiery bristled
ominously across the road, close to the Rue de
Faubourg Montmartre, and that the commanding
officer would let neither man, woman, nor
child pass. The Boulevards were crowded,
almost impassable in fact, with persons of every
grade, from the "lion" of the Jockey Club, or
the English nobleman, to the pretty grisette
in her white cap, and the scowling, bearded
citizen, clad in blouse and calotte, and looking
very much as if he knew more of a barricade
than he chose to aver. The houses on either
side of the way bore frightful traces of the
combat of the previous day. The Maison Doré,
the Café Anglais, the Opéra Comique, Tortoni's,
the Jockey Club, the Belle Jardinière, the Hôtel
des Affaires étrangères, and scores, I might
almost say hundreds, of the houses had their
windows smashed, or the magnificent sheets of
plate-glass starred with balls; the walls pock-
marked with bullets: seamed and scarred
and blackened with gunpowder. A grocer,
close to the Rue de Marivaux, told me that he
had not been able to open his door that morning
for the dead bodies piled on the step before
it. Round all the young trees (the old trees
were cut down for former barricades in
February and June 1848), the ground shelves a
little in a circle; in these circles there were
pools of blood. The people—the extraordinary,
inimitable, consistently inconsistent French
people—were unconcernedly lounging about,
looking at these things with pleased yet
languid curiosity. They paddled in the pools of
blood; they traced curiously the struggles of
some wounded wretch, who, shot or sabred
on the curbstone, had painfully, deviously,
dragged himself (so the gouts of blood showed)
to a door-step—to die. They felt the walls,
pitted by musket bullets; they poked their
walking-sticks into the holes made by the
cannon balls. It was as good as a play to
them.

The road on either side was lined with
dragoons armed cap-à-pié. The poor tired
horses were munching the forage with which
the muddy ground was strewn; and the
troopers sprawled listlessly about, smoking
their short pipes, and mending their torn
costume or shattered accoutrements. Indulging,
however, in the dolce far niente, as they seemed
to be, they were ready for action at a moment's
notice. There was, about two o'clock, an
alerte—a rumour of some tumult towards the
Rue St. Denis. One solitary trumpet sounded
''boot and saddle;" and, with almost magical
celerity, each dragoon twisted a quantity of
forage into a species of rope, which he hung
over his saddle-bow, crammed his half-
demolished loaf into his holsters, buckled on his
cuirass; then, springing himself on his horse,
sat motionless: each cavalier with his pistol
cocked, and his finger on the trigger. The
crowd thickened; and in the road itself
there was a single file of cabs, carts, and
even private carriages. Almost every
moment detachments of prisoners, mostly blouses,
passed, escorted by cavalry; then a yellow flag
was seen, announcing the approach of an
ambulance, or long covered vehicle filled with
wounded soldiers; then hearses; more
prisoners, more ambulances, orderly dragoons
at full gallop, orderlies, military surgeons
in their cocked hats and long frock coats,
broughams with smart general officers inside,
all smoking.

As to the soldiers, they appear never to
leave off smoking. They smoke in the guard-
room, off duty, and even when on guard. An
eye-witness of the combat told me that many
of the soldiers had, when charging, short pipes
in their mouths, and the officers, almost
invariably, smoked cigars.

In reference to the discipline of the French
soldiery, and their extreme trustworthiness
against their own countrymen, I have heard
some wise men, within these few days, much
astonished by, and virtuously indignant at,
the testimony of certain witnesses, published
in the "Times" newspaper. They have their
confirmation though (new and strange as they
are to such authorities) in the evidence of an
officer of some merit, called The Duke of
Wellington, before a Select Committee on
Punishments in the Army. The following
passage, occurs:—

"Upon service, do you conceive that the discipline
of the Army, which you had under your command
in the Peninsula, was superior to the discipline of the
French troops opposed to you?—I have not the most
distant doubt of it; infinitely superior.

"Superior in respect to the treatment of the country
in which they were serving?—Not to be compared with
it, even in their own country, an enemy's country to
us; and to them, their own country.

"In what respect was the French Army so inferior to
ours!—A general system of plunder; great laxity in
the performance of their duty; great irregularity; in
short, irregularity, which we could not venture to risk
existence on.