referred these terms to Polignac, who at once
declared that such conditions rendered any
conference useless.

"We have, then, civil war," said M.
Lafitte. The marshal bowed, and the
Deputies retired.

War now began in earnest. The drums
of the National Guard beat "to arms."
The tocsin clanged incessantly, and roused
the people to madness. At about two
o'clock, a cannon on the bridge near the
Marché aux Fleurs raked the quay with
grape-shot; the people then advanced with
fury, and several of the guards fell, and
others were led off wounded.

A studious, abstracted-looking person,
quietly walking along the quay, with folded
arms, was struck dead by a bullet from the
opposite side of the Seine. At the corner
of an adjoining street, an old man lay, with
his back leaning against a wall, apparently
asleep in the midst of the incessant rattle of
musketry; but he was dead, and the blood
was bubbling up from a shot-hole in his
lungs. There was tremendous fighting at
the Halles, in the Rue St. Denis, where
the Royal Guard, strongly posted, were
besieged. The people threw up barricades
at every outlet, and from behind these
impromptu ramparts, from the corners of
the abutting streets, and from every adjacent
window, blazed furiously and unceasingly
at the troops. There was severe
fighting, too, in the Rue St. Honoré,
opposite the Palais Royal: while at the
Place de Grève, the Swiss guards were
repulsed with great loss. At the Portes
St. Denis and St. Martin, on the quays,
all along the boulevards, and at the Place
Vendôme, the slaughter was prodigious.
In the Rue Montmartre, Marmont himself
headed the attack. Collecting his troops
in the Place des Victoires, the Marshal
charged down the Rues de Mail des
Fossés, Croix des Petits Champs, and
the Rue Neuve des Petits Champs. He
then scoured the Rue Montmartre as far as
the Rue Joquelet, where the people stood
at bay, and every house was turned into a
fortress. Black flags waved from several
edifices. In the Place de Grève, thousands
of people fired at the Swiss. There was
firing even from the windows of the Louvre.
The soldiers in the Rue Marché St. Honoré
shot down many innocent and unarmed
people. The Place Louis the Sixteenth
was crowded with troops of all arms, from
Versailles. A strong park of artillery was
placed in position along the garden front
of the Tuileries: the cavalry, dismounted,
standing by their horses' heads. A party of
Polytechnique students mounted guard, and
protected the General Post-office, in the
Rue Jean Jacques Rousseau. In the Place
Vendôme, General Gerard and two
regiments of the line joined the people: who,
shouting, "Brave General Gerard, we will
never forsake you!" and charging the
troops, routed them on the first onslaught,
and took possession of their ammunition.
At the Porte St. Martin, the women and
children unpaved the streets, and carried up
the stones to the roofs of their houses, in
order to drop them on the military. In the
Rue St. Denis, the people captured (to their
extravagant delight) two pieces of cannon.
The Swiss were everywhere cut to pieces.

At the Hôtel de Ville, the attack was
especially furious and determined. Lads from
the Polytechnique fought with the foremost,
and brought powder for the people. After
losing about seven hundred men, the
insurgents at last poured into the building, and
fought, foot to foot and hand to hand, with
the Swiss until they won every room; but
more lancers, Royal Guards, gendarmes,
and artillery, arriving, the people were
defeated, and the Hôtel de Ville was again
taken by the Royalists. General Layafette
now placed himself at the head of thirty
thousand National Guards, who had
collected, and advanced with six pieces of
cannon. Eight hundred Royal Guards and
Swiss, driven from the Hôtel de Ville
by the ceaseless fire from, every window
in the Place, retreated along the quay,
sullenly keeping up a deadly file and platoon
fire as they retrograded, until, joined by
fresh Swiss and guards, one hundred
cuirassiers and four pieces of flying artillery,
they again advanced to recover the Hôtel
de Ville. The cannon loaded with canister
produced a terrible carnage. The dead
men lay in heaps. The patriots fell
back for a time down the Rues de
Matroit and du Mouton, and the Royalists
were a second time masters of the blood-
stained Hôtel de Ville; but the people
shouting "Vive la Liberté," "Vive la
Charte," broke again, like a thunderstorm,
upon the building. Driven back by
the furious and repeated charges of the
cuirassiers, the insurgents would perhaps
have been routed for a time, but for one
act of devoted and patriotic courage. A
brave lad waving a tri-coloured flag near
the suspension bridge, at the Place de Grève,
suddenly shouted: "If we must cross this
bridge, I will set the example. If I die,
remember my name is Arcole!"