CHAPTER VIII

Invasion of the Artillery Museum--Armour of François I.--Charles IX.'s arquebuse--La place de l'Odéon--What Charras had been doing--The uniform of the École polytechnique--Millotte--The prison Montaigu--The barracks of l'Estrapade--D'Hostel--A Bonapartist--Riding master Chopin--Lothon--The general in command

I was awakened next morning by my servant Joseph. He was standing by my bedside calling me with ever increasing loudness.

"Monsieur!... Monsieur!!... Monsieur!!!..."

At the third _Monsieur_, I groaned, rubbed my eyes and sat up. "Well," I asked, "what is the matter?"

"Oh, don't you hear, monsieur?" Joseph exclaimed, holding his head with his hands.

"How should I hear, you idiot? I was asleep."

"But fighting is going on all round us, monsieur!"

"Really?"

He opened the window.

"Listen! it sounds as if it were in the courtyard."

And, indeed, the firing seemed to me to come from no very distant point.

"The deuce!" I said, "where does it come from?"

"From Saint-Thomas-d'Aquin, monsieur."

"What! from the church itself?"

"No, from the Artillery Museum.... Monsieur knows that a post is stationed there."

"Ah! true," I exclaimed, "the Artillery Museum! I will go there."

"What! Monsieur will go there?"

"Certainly."

"Oh, good Heavens!"

"Quick, help me! ... A glass of Madeira or Alicante wine!... Oh! the wretches! they will pillage everything!"

That, indeed, was the thought which preoccupied my mind, and that was what made me run to the place where I heard the firing going on. I remembered the archæological treasures that I had seen and handled, one after another, in the studies I had written on Henri III., Henri IV. and Louis XIII., and I saw them all being scattered among the hands of people who did not know their value: marvellous rich treasures of art being given to the first comer who would exchange them for a pound of tobacco or a packet of cartridges. I was ready in five minutes and darted off in the direction of Saint-Thomas-d'Aquin. For the third time, the assailants had been repulsed. This was easily explained: they were madly attacking the Museum by the two openings made by the rue du Bac and the rue Saint-Dominique. The firing of the soldiers raked the two streets and swept them clean with deplorable facility. I looked at the houses in the rue du Bac, which on both sides formed the corner of the rue Gribauval, and I judged that their backs must look upon the place Saint-Thomas-d'Aquin, and that from their upper storeys one could easily dominate the post of the Museum of Artillery. I confided to the combatants the plan suggested to me by the view of the position: it was instantly adopted by them. I knocked at the door of one of two houses, No. 35 rue du Bac, and it was opened after a long wait; still, it did open, in the end, and eight to ten armed men entered with me and we rushed upstairs to the higher storeys. I and three or four other fellows reached an attic, which was rounded off at the top to fit the shape of the roof above it, and here I established myself with as much safety as if I had been behind the parapet of a bastion.

Then firing began, but with quite different results. In ten minutes the post had lost five or six of its men. Suddenly, all the soldiers disappeared, the firing died down. This must, we thought, be some kind of ambuscade, so we hesitated before quitting our intrenchments. But the porter of the Museum soon appeared at the door making unmistakable signs of peace So we went down. The soldiers had scaled the walls and run away over the surrounding courts and gardens. A portion of the insurgents was already crowding up the corridors when I reached the Museum.

"For God's sake, friends," I cried, "respect the armour!"

"What! Why should we respect it?"

"I like that joke," replied one of the men to whom I addressed myself. "Why, to take the weapons is the very reason we are here!" he said.

It then occurred to me that, of course, this must have been the sole object of the attack, and that there would be no means of saving the magnificent collection from pillage. I considered: the only thing left to do was to take my share of the most valuable of the armour.

One of two things would happen: either they would keep the arms or bring them back to the Museum. In either case, it was better that I should take charge of the precious things, rather than anyone else. If I kept them, they would be in the hands of a man who knew how to appreciate them. If they were to be restored, they would be in the hands of one who would give them up. I ran to the best place, where there was an equestrian trophy of the Renaissance period. I seized a shield, a helmet and a sword which were known to have belonged to François I., also a magnificent arquebuse which had belonged, according to the same tradition, to Charles IX., and had been used by him to fire upon the Huguenots. This tradition has become almost historic, on account of the quatrain which the arquebuse carries, inlaid in silver letters, on its barrel, forming one single line from the breech to the sighting-point:--

"Pour mayntenir la foy, Je suis belle et fidèle; Aux ennemis du Roy Je suis belle et cruelle!"

I put the helmet on my head, the shield on my arm; I hung the sword by my side, put the arquebuse on my shoulder, and so made my way, bending under their weight, to the rue de l'Université. I nearly fell when I reached the height of my fourth floor. If these were, indeed, the very shield and buckler that François I. had worn at Marignan, and if he remained fourteen hours in the saddle with these in addition to his other armour, I could believe in the prowess of Ogier the Dane and Roland and the four sons of Aymon.

"Oh! monsieur," Joseph exclaimed, when he caught sight of me, "where have you been, and whatever is all that old iron?"

I did not attempt to correct Joseph's ideas with respect to my booty; it would only have been waste of time. I simply told him to help me to take off the helmet, which nearly suffocated me. I laid them all down on my bed and rushed back for more of this splendid quarry. I brought back next the cuirass, axe and the bulk of the arms. I gave all my fine trophies back, later, to the Artillery Museum, and I still possess the letter of the former Director, thanking me for their restitution, and giving me free entry on days not open to the general public. It was a curious spectacle to see that huge removal of the Museum. Everyone took what suited him best, but it is only fair to say that these worthy fellows were much more careful to select arms they thought most suitable to fight with than sumptuously wrought ones. So nearly the whole of the collection of old muskets, flint and percussion caps, from the time of Louis XIV. to our own day, disappeared. One man took away a rampart gun that must have weighed at least a hundred and fifty pounds; four others dragged a piece of iron cannon with which they meant to attack the Louvre. I found the man who had taken the rampart gun, a couple of hours later, lying unconscious upon the quay. He had rammed his gun with two handfuls of powder and from twelve to fifteen balls; then, from one side of the Seine, leaning it up against the parapet, he had fired upon a regiment of cuirassiers which was marching along by the Louvre. He had made some cruel gaps in the regiment, but the recoil of the gun had flung him ten feet backwards, dislocating his shoulder and breaking his jaw. Before I found him, I had witnessed several scenes characteristic enough to be worth putting down here. Intoxication from wine, brandy or rum is nothing to that caused by the smell of powder, the noise of firing and the sight of blood. I can understand a man flying at the first shot of gun or cannon, but I cannot understand anyone who has once tasted fire leaving before it ceases. At all events, this was the effect it was beginning to have upon myself.

Delanoue, whom I met, who was hunting all over the place for a gun, told me there was going to be a rallying of forces on the place de l'Odéon. I had already heard of this gathering the day before. Unfortunately, I had only my gun with me and I did not wish to part with it; I therefore mentioned to Delanoue the Artillery Museum as a place where he might find what he was in search of, and then I set off at a run down the rue de Grenelle. The place de l'Odéon was blocked and there must have been something like five or six hundred men there. Two or three pupils from the École polytechnique were in command of some companies. In one of these uniforms, I recognised Charras, whom I had seen dressed the previous day as a civilian.

So he was neither killed nor wounded. This is the story of what happened, which had made people believe he was dead.

As will be seen, he had not wasted his time since the day before, and particularly since the morning. When he had parted from Carrel and me, he went through the faubourg Saint-Germain, where he had done his utmost to procure a gun; but, on 28 July 1830, a gun was as scarce as Juvenal's _rara avis._ He had heard of, the _monsieur_ who was giving away gunpowder at the small door of the Institut and had gone to have an interview with the worthy citizen. The _monsieur_ not only refused to give him a gun, but went still further and refused him any powder because he had no gun.

Charras next made this sapient observation--

"I will go where there is fighting, I will put myself in the midst of the fighters, I will constitute myself the legatee of the first man who falls dead and take possession of his gun."

In consequence of that resolution, he had gone along the quai des Orfèvres and met the 15th Light Infantry, with whom he held a conversation; perhaps they were the very same I had talked with; but, as he was alone, unarmed and had kept his hands in his pockets, they had let him pass through. When through, Charras gained the Pont Notre-Dame and, from thence, the suspension bridge. Now we know that the insurrection was raging furiously on the latter bridge. Charras arrived half an hour earlier than I did and waited. He did not have to wait long, for a man was soon struck in the eye by a bullet, and rolled at his feet. Charras seized the dead man's gun. A street urchin, who was probably watching for the same opportunity, also ran up, but was too late. Armed with his gun, Charras was still not much better off, for he had neither powder nor shot.

"I have some," the urchin said, and he drew a packet of fifteen cartridges from his pocket.

"Let me have them," said Charras.

"No.... We will divide them, if you like."

"All right, we will."

"Here are seven, then; but let me use the gun after you?"

"I suppose so, since that was our agreement."

Charras scrupulously fired only his seven cartridges, then honourably passed the gun to the urchin and withdrew behind the parapet; from actor he became spectator and, in the latter capacity, he sheltered himself as best he could. The street lad fired four cartridges, and then the charge came that we had witnessed from a distance. The lad rushed on the bridge with the rest, and Charras, although unarmed, followed the stream. I have previously described the effect of the three successive discharges. Charras was spun round under the blast of that whirlwind of iron, and clung on to his neighbour to keep himself from falling; but the man had been mortally wounded and fell, dragging Charras with him. Hence had arisen the rumour that he was killed. By good fortune, however, he escaped safe and sound, but, not feeling too sure of the fact, he tested it by reaching the other side of the quay and threading his way through a little street in the shelter of which he was able, without interruption, to feel himself all over. As for the urchin and his gun, he had to accept the inevitable: the lad had disappeared like Romulus in the storm, or Curtius in the gulf, or Empedocles in the volcano! Charras then began to wonder what possible use a man could be without a gun, or who did not know where to procure one. A band of patriots, unarmed, like himself, happening to pass at the same moment, seemed to have come for the express purpose of answering his question.

"Well, citizen," one of the men said, "will you come along with us to sound the tocsin from Saint-Séverin?"

"All right!" Charras replied, it being a matter of indifference to him where he went, so long as he took some part in being useful to the cause. And he went with them to Saint-Séverin. The doors were shut; they knocked at all, little and great, from the door for marriages and baptisms down to the door of the last Sacrament. In cases like this, decisions are quickly arrived at: they decided to burst the doors open, as they would not open of their own accord; they tore away a beam from a house that was being built and a dozen men carried it to serve as a battering-ram. At the third charge delivered by this huge implement against the door, the locks and bolts gave way. The sacristan arrived upon the scene and opened the door altogether, just as a fourth blow was going to break it in. When the door was opened, they soon set the bell ringing, and Charras's work at Saint-Séverin was concluded. He went to join a party of friends in the Latin Quarter, with whom he spent the night constructing a plan.

Now, the uniform worn by the students of the École polytechnique had been very much looked down upon before the insurrection was declared, but had gone up in reputation very considerably as the insurrection advanced. The plan made during the night was to go at daybreak in search of uniforms of the École polytechnique. So, about four in the morning, Charras, with a friend of his, called Lebeuf, rang at the porter's gate. The rise in sentiment had made its way even to the École, and both porter and professors gave the two rebels a warm reception, shaking hands with them and giving them the clothes they asked for.

I remember one small incident: Charras, having found a coat, apparently was not able to find trousers to match; for, with a blue coat, he wore grey trousers, which, as a uniform, was rather meagre. The two friends thus being fitted with uniforms and particularly with hats--the hat always plays an important rôle in insurrections--they made their way to the place de l'Odéon. They heard, _en route_, that guns were being distributed in the rue de Tournon. Indeed, the barracks of the Gendarmerie had just been captured, and muskets, pistols, sabres and swords were being distributed in a fairly orderly manner.

Charras and Lebeuf joined the queue, but, when they reached the office, those in the barracks would only give them swords, because they said that students from the École polytechnique were all officers by right and, in that capacity, were destined to command detachments; they ought, therefore, to receive swords and not guns.

Not even the most earnest entreaties of these two young people were able to change the programme--they would only give them swords and no other arms. But a student of colossal stature and herculean strength did not accept this improvised lawmaking so easily as Lebeuf and Charras had done: he seized the distributor by the throat and began to strangle him, telling him he would not let him go until he had a gun. The distributor seemed to consider the argument sound, for he hastened to give a gun to the merry blade who could put into action so sensible an application of that branch of philosophy we call logic; and the student went away armed to his own liking. This was Millotte who, afterwards, became a representative of the People and who sat in the Legislative Assembly with Lamartine and our friend Noël Parfait. Millotte is now one of our most respected exiles. In virtue of his uniform, his sword and the rights possessed by the students of the École to become officers, Charras took the command of a troop of a hundred and fifty men. A drummer and standard-bearer put the finishing touch to this troop. Then the question was where to go? A voice shouted--

"To the prison Montaigu, place du Panthéon!"

So Charras and his troop started for that destination.

Revolutions have their mysterious winds which blow men to one point or another without any apparent reason; they are the waterspouts that blow up from under the ocean and they go south or north, east or west, how or why nobody knows. It is the breath of God which guides them. At the prison Montaigu, they found a hundred and fifty men under arms, ready to defend themselves. A brewer from the rue Saint-Antoine, named Maes, was there--another Santerre--with some sixty insurgents. He was on horseback and wore the old uniform of the National Guard. The struggle had threatened to become hot, and they were trying to come to terms.

"Hulloa! Captain," cried Charras, "will you come to me, or would you rather I came to you?"

"Come to me, monsieur," the captain replied.

"I have your parole?"

"Yes."

Charras then approached him, and there ensued a dialogue between them, the offspring of their peculiar situation, which could not have taken place under other circumstances--a dialogue in which Charras tried to prove to the captain that it would be far more advantageous and honourable and patriotic for him to join the people's side or, at the very least, to lend them guns. The captain did not seem to understand Charras's logic so well as the distributor of muskets in the rue de Tournon had understood that of Millotte. Charras redoubled his eloquence, but made no headway; yet if he failed to advance, his men did not: they came up nearer, little by little.

The reader knows the true Parisian, who never gives up his end but presses towards it out of curiosity or passion; he slips through the hands of police, sentries and squadrons, dragging one foot after the other, with honied tones and wooing gesture, part cat, part fox; then, if you want to keep him back, he is soon far away! When you want to stop him, he is already past you! And, as soon as he feels himself out of your reach, his sole answer to your reproaches is a mocking gesture or a sarcastic remark.

In such fashion had Charras's men slipped past the sentinels and come up imperceptibly to their commander, and, consequently, nearer to the soldiers; so effectively was this movement executed that, in five minutes' time, before Charras had himself perceived them, they were within ten paces of their adversaries and ready for a hand-to-hand tussle with them. Whether it was the mingling of the forces or the names of Jena, Austerlitz and Marengo of which Charras reminded them; whether it was the tricolour ribbons, with their stirring tones of colour, that floated before his eyes; or whether he really felt a brotherly sympathy extended to him, which decided the officer to capitulate, Charras did not know; but he realised that a capitulation was arrived at, that his troop obtained fifty guns and the captain's word of honour that he and his soldiers would remain neutral. True, the captain was inexorable in his refusal of cartridges; but Providence did not stop thus half-way: it had given the guns, it was also to bestow the requisite cartridges.

The fifty guns were distributed among those of Charras's men who had no firearms, and among those of a fresh troop that had come up meanwhile, who were in the same plight. This new troop was commanded by another student of the École polytechnique called d'Hostel. The division made, again the question arose as to where they were to go.

"To the Estrapade!" cried a voice.

"To the Estrapade!" all the voices repeated in unison.

So off they rushed towards the Estrapade.

Our Parisian readers will know the position of the barracks of the Estrapade, and that they are approached by a narrow street which is easily defended. There were nearly four hundred men; quite enough, in like circumstances, to attack Metz or Valenciennes or Mont-Saint-Michel; but they were so elated with their recent negotiations at the place du Panthéon that they decided to try the same tactics in the rue de l'Estrapade. This time d'Hostel proposed himself as negotiator; for, he said, he had accomplices inside the place. He advanced with a handkerchief in his hand, leaving his gun with one of his men. They held a parley between the street and the first floor; but this was too high up to be heard, so d'Hostel cleared the distance between himself and his interlocutors by suddenly climbing up the wall. How did he do that? It was a miracle to those who watched his ascent! D'Hostel was extremely adroit, and renowned at the École for his gymnastic feats. In an instant, he had reached one of the windows on the first floor, he was lifted in by his arms and found himself inside the barracks, where he was swallowed up like the fiends in English theatres which disappear through trap-doors. Ten minutes later, he reappeared, clad in the coat and leather cap of the officer, whilst the latter wore the uniform of a pupil of the École polytechnique, with the three-cornered hat in his hand, and bowed to the people. The game was won! The square resounded with vivats and applause. The soldiers abandoned the barracks and surrendered a hundred of their guns. This ruse, executed by Charras and d'Hostel, was worthy of winning them the posts of ambassadors to London and St. Petersburg! But, unluckily, the deed either did not reach the ears of the Government or was not properly appreciated by it, so they sent instead, to those two cities, M. le Prince de Talleyrand and M. le Maréchal Maison, who confined themselves to committing stupid acts.

Full of pride at this second triumph of theirs, Charras and d'Hostel reached the place de l'Odéon. I was struck with the ease with which drums seem to multiply during a time of Revolution; they appear to ooze out of walls and rise out of the pavements--Charras and d'Hostel had about fifteen between them. At the same time that we reached the place de l'Odéon, a piece of cannon that had been taken from the post was being drawn through the rue des Fossés-Monsieur-le-Prince by five men, three of whom were firemen; next came a carriage, containing three barrels of powder from the powder magazine at the Jardin des Plantes; I think it was driven by Liédot, who has since become an artillery captain. The barrels were broken open and the distribution of their contents begun. Everybody had some, either in his coat pocket or handkerchief or cap or tobacco pouch. They were smoking amidst all this, incredible as it may appear. How Jean Bart would have shuddered from head to foot! But they very soon discovered that all this powder was useless and that the best thing to do with it would be to make it into cartridges. This was the more feasible since they had just received two or three thousand bullets from the passage Dauphine. Four men were occupied in moulding them out of the lead of the gutters, in a tavern to the left of the square as you come to it from the rue de l'Odéon. The only thing they lacked was paper. However, all the windows facing the square were wide open and they only had to cry out "Paper is wanted!" and soon the air was flecked with projectiles of every shape and description, but of the same material: paper fell in exercise-books, in reams and in volumes. I was very nearly knocked down by a _Gradus ad Parnassum!_

Amongst the crowds were about a hundred old soldiers, who set to work and, in less than an hour made and distributed three thousand cartridges. The spectacle must have been seen in order to realise the animation, high spirits and gaiety that prevailed. Everybody called out something, whether "Vive la République!" or "Vive la Charte!" One man of Charras's band made himself hoarse with shouting "Vive Napoléon II.!" The oft-repeated cry at length exciting Charras, who was already, at that period, a strong Republican, he went to this Bonapartist and said--

"Look here, do you suppose we are fighting for Napoleon II.?"

"You can fight for whom you like," the man replied, "but that's the man I mean to fight for!"

"You have the right to, if you wish it, of course.... But if you fight for him you must enlist in some other troop than this."

"Oh! that will suit me all right," said the man: "there are plenty of engagements going on nowadays!"

He therefore left Charras's ranks and went to seek service in a troop led by a chief who was of less decided opinions.

At this very moment, by some strange coincidence, a man called Chopin, who owned the stables of the Luxembourg, arrived at a gallop at the place de l'Odéon; he was clad in a buttoned-up frock-coat, wore a three-cornered hat and rode a white horse. He pulled up in the very centre of the square, with one hand held behind his back. The resemblance to Napoleon was so striking and extraordinary that the whole crowd, not a single member of which had taken sides with the expelled Bonapartist, began to shout with one accord and simultaneously, "Vive l'Émpereur!" One good woman of seventy took the joke quite seriously and fell on her knees, making the sign of the cross, and exclaiming--

"Oh! Jesus! I shall not die, then, before I have seen him once more!..."

If Chopin had desired to put himself at the head of the six to eight hundred men there present, it is probable that he could have marched straight off to Vienna.

Charras was furious, whilst I completely forgot the political situation of the moment and became solely a philosophic student of humanity. I only needed a tub and Laïs and I could have established myself there for ever in the place de l'Odéon, as Diogenes established himself in the gymnasium of Corinth.

But a serious discussion drew me from my dreams. They wanted to make Charras general-in-chief and he would not take the position. He offered the citizens Lothon, a tall, fine young fellow, a combination of Hercules and Antinous, as a suitable candidate, instead; his principal reason being that he was on foot while Lothon rode on horseback; therefore, he considered Lothon had far more claim to the generalship. And, in truth, no general-in-chief was ever seen afoot. But Lothon excused himself fiercely from being appointed to this high post. For all this, he was on the point of being obliged to yield, when a gentleman came up to him and whispered--

"Oh! monsieur, if you will not be general-in-chief, let me take your place.... I am an ex-captain and I think I have a right to this honour."

Never did ambition display itself at a more fitting opportunity.

"Oh! monsieur," Lothon replied, "you will indeed render me a welcome service!"

Then, addressing the crowd, he asked--

"You want a general-in-chief?"

"Yes, yes!" was repeated on all sides.

"Well, then, I introduce this gentleman to you ... he is an ex-captain who is _covered with wounds_ and who would much like to be your general-in-command."

"Bravo!" a hundred voices shouted.

"Pardon me for covering you with wounds, my dear monsieur," said Lothon, as he stepped to the ground and presented his horse to the newly elected chief; "but I thought it the surest method of getting you promoted above the intermediate ranks."

"Oh! monsieur," the delighted captain said, "there is no harm done!"

Then he addressed the crowd--

"Well," he asked, "are we ready?"

"Yes! yes! yes!"

"Then forward, march! Beat drums!"

And the drums began to beat, and they all went down the rue de l'Odéon singing _la Marseillaise._ At the Bussy crossing, from some strategic manœuvre unknown to me, the troop divided itself into three. One part went towards the rue Sainte-Marguerite, another to the rue Dauphine and the third went straight on: I was among the latter. We had to approach the Louvre by the Pont des Arts, in order to take the bull by the horns. It was on coming out on the quay that I found the man with the rampart gun leant up against the wall, groaning, both his shoulder and his jaw dislocated.

Oh! I must not forget to say that at every street-corner I had seen stuck up on the walls bills announcing the nomination of the Provisional Government and the proclamation by MM. La Fayette, Gérard and de Choiseul calling the people to arms. What a singular effect it would have produced on those three gentlemen if they had been in my place and read what I read!