CHAPTER IX.

THE YEARS OF REVOLUTION AND REACTION-ELEMENTS OF DISCONTENT IN FRANCE-THE REFORM BANQUETS-FEBRUARY 22ND AND FOLLOWING DAYS-THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT-THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY-CAVAIGNAC AND LOUIS NAPOLEON-THE REFORMING PONTIFF-SICILY AND NAPLES VIENNA AND BERLIN-ITALIAN INDEPENDENCE-GERMAN UNITY-ENGLAND AND IRELAND-MASSACRE AND PILLAGE IN NAPLES-FLIGHT OF THE POPE FROM ROME - OVERTHROW OF CHARLES ALBERT-DISPERSION OF THE PRUSSIAN CONSTITUENT-INSURRECTIONS IN GERMANY-BOMBARDMENT OF VIENNA-ABDICATION OF THE AUSTRIAN EMPEROR-DISPERSION OF THE FRANCKFORT PARLIAMENT-HUNGARIAN WAR OF INDEPENDENCE-FALL OF ROME-INVASION OF HUNGARY BY RUSSIA---GORGEY'S SURRENDER-DOMESTIC RETROSPECT OF THE YEARS 1846 TO '50-DEATHS OF POLITICAL CELEBRITIES.

WE have reached the last stage of our flight with Time. We descend upon the soil of France, from which we set out-and we find it, as then, rocking with the earthquake of revolution.

The dynasty of July had again been threatened by a Pretender; the life of its head repeatedly attempted by assassins; and its stability weakened by the death of its heir. On the 6th of August, 1840, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte landed at Boulogne from a steamer which he had manned in the Thames with fifty or sixty desperate adherents, exhibited a live eagle, and appealed to the memory of his uncle; but was captured by the local authorities, tried by the Court of Peers, and sentenced to imprisonment in the castle of Ham, from which he escaped six years afterwards, disguised as a workman. In July, 1842, the Duke of Orleans was killed by the overturning of his carriage: the eldest of his two infant sons was recognised as heir to the French throne, and the Regency confided to his uncle, the Duc de Nemours, instead of the Duchess of Orleans. The sad event seemed rather to inflame than moderate Louis Philippe's solicitude for the aggrandisement of his family. Against the opinion of his wisest advisers, to the intense dissatisfaction of the country, and at the imminent risk of a rupture with England, he effected an alliance between his youngest son, the Duc de Montpensier, and the presumptive heiress to the Spanish throne. A stagnation of trade through the greater part of 1847 produced deep distress among the operative classes in the winter, and increased the discontent of the bourgeoisie at the heavy weight of taxation they had to bear. The Liberal opposition in the two Chambers gave direction to this feeling by putting out a programme of Electoral Reforms. The minister, M. Guizot, challenged a display of public sentiment in support of these demands; and it was given in the form of banquets in all the chief towns of France. But in these assemblages Republicanism displayed

itself with a boldness and strength alarming to the Dynastic opposition led by MM. Thiers and Odillon Barrot, and furnishing the Government with a ground of offence. The King's speech on the re-assembling of the Chambers, in February, 1848, characterised the Peers and Deputies who had attended the banquets as hostile to himself and blind to results. A constitutional question was thus raised, on which all sections of the Oppositionthe Legitimists included-united against the Government. The former demanded a declaratory law on the right of public meetings, but the latter refused it—they would give an opportunity of appeal to the tribunals. The citizens of the twelfth arrondissement of Paris had invited the Liberal Representatives to a banquet, to be held on Sunday, the 20th of February. This crowning demonstration the Government forbade, but intimated that they would not prevent it. The Deputies accepted the test, and the banquet was postponed to the 22nd, that it might be the more imposing. To aid in rendering it so, the managers invited the National Guards of the district to attend in uniform, but unarmed. At this, the Government took, or affected to take, alarm; ordered the dispersion of the guests, if they assembled ; and concentrated troops upon the city. The Deputies resolved by a majority not to attend the banquet, advised the people to peaceableness, and promised to impeach the Ministers. A minority resolved to be present at all hazards, but the committee acquiesced in the advice of the majority, and relinquished the banquet. The next morning-Tuesday, February the 22nd-fifty thousand soldiers were in and around the capital. The people crowded into the boulevards, but with no more apparent motive than curiosity; until a column of youths electrified them by the singing of the Marseillaise, and led them towards the Chambers, which were well guarded. In the hall of Deputies, M. Barrot placed upon the table of the President the act of accusation against the Ministry. M. Guizot took it up, read it, and sat down with the smile that welcomes rather than contemns the strife. After a short and gloomy sitting, the Chamber adjourned. Night fell, and the authorities held apparently undisputed possession of the city. It seemed the affectation of caution to bivouack the troops in the streets. But there was another army afoot-the four or five hundred ever-vigilant, indomitable men who were the sworn soldiers of the Republic of the future, now so near. Some of these were sitting in committees-others, converting the tortuous streets around the cloisters of St. Méry into the citadel of the insurrection—and others, again, disarming the weak outposts of the National Guards. On Wednesday morning, barricades were rising in all the streets ramifying from this centre, and in the most democratic districts. The troops were soon wearied by levelling these undefended but massive structures; and the National Guards were summoned by the rappel. They turned out, but joined with the people in cries for Reform and the abase

ment of Guizot. The Chambers were sitting all day, expecting communications from the King, but received none. In the evening, it was known that the King had summoned M. Molé, and the citizens illuminated, in sign of joy at the downfal of Guizot. But those were the funeral lights of the monarchy. In front and on the flank of the hotel of the hated Minister, at the corner of the Rue de Choiseul, several columns of armed workmen and students met, or were passing, headed by a red flag. Their cries, or the flare of their torches, startled the horse of the officer commanding the battalion in guard of the hotel. The animal reared and plunged in the confusion of the moment, a shot was fired by an unknown hand—and in the next, from panic or passion, the front rank of soldiers presented and fired. The head of the advancing column was decimated—the road was cumbered with dead, and the pavement in pools of blood-the reverberation of the musketry brought thousands rushing to the spot. The column quickly re-forms, repulses the officer, who, frantic with grief, expostulates and beseeches-the corpses are placed on waggons, and borne past the offices of the National and the Réforme, the moderate and extreme Republican journals, from both of which orators further inflame the people. From every house of the populous districts rush forth men, now armed and eager to revenge their fallen brethren, and to secure the long-promised Republic. Barricades rise in every district, the National Guards shielding the people from the disheartened soldiers. The beating of tocsins, the ringing of bells, the noise of firing, fill the capital with anxiety, and carry alarm even to the Tuileries. At midnight the King sends for M. Thiers, who instantly attends. He finds that Marshal Bugeaud-hateful to the populace from the memory of former conflicts-has just been put in command of the city. Thiers advises his recall, and insists that M. Barrot be associated with himself in the Ministry. To both the King reluctantly consents, and Barrot is fetched. A proclamation is drawn up suspending hostilities, and promising amnesty and reform. The proclamation is nowhere heeded, except by the troops-they cease firing, and barricades multiply and spread, till even the Tuileries are nearly invested. It is eleven o'clock on the morning of Thursday. As the Royal family are at breakfast, officers rush in announcing that within three hundred paces the soldiers are being disarmed by the people. The King rides forth, and is met with but few cries of "Vive le Roi." He returns dispirited and perplexed. Presently, M. Emile Girardin-a deputy, and the editor of La Presse-announces with unceremonious faithfulness, that the King must abdicate; he even presents for signature a bulletin which he has prepared. The King hesitates, but is persuaded by his youngest son, and writes "I abdicate in favour of my grandson, the Count de Paris; and trust that he will be more fortunate than I." Girardin throws it to the

crowd; but it is unsigned, they take it for a snare, and continue to press upon the palace. Another copy is carried out by a veteran and popular Marshal, and it is snatched from his hand by Lagrange, the incarnate spirit of the revolution. At this moment Bugeaud reappears, and remonstrates with the King, though a bullet has just entered an apartment of the palace. Again Montpensier overrules his father, and the aged King and Queen hastily prepare to escape. The Duchess of Orleans entreats permission to accompany them, but it is denied. Two carriages are fetched from the public stands, and brought round to a garden gate, reached by a subterranean passage. An officer in disguise obtains an escort of cuirassiers, who gallop after the humble cortège-but the precaution is unneeded; the people have recognised the fugitives, and care not to detain them. As Louis Philippe and his Queen leave by one door, the Duchess of Orleans and her children quit the palace by another, and cross the garden which separates it from the hall of the Deputies. Among the representatives who entered the Chamber two hours before was one destined, quite unconsciously to himself, to be ere night at the head of the Republic of France-Lamartine. A Royalist by birth, and a servant of the Restoration, he was a Republican in sentiment, but not in politics. He had recently written the " History of the Girondists;" and thereby advanced infinitely beyond even his own conceptions, the reign of a pacific democracy. He had abstained from the Reform banquets, but was at the head of the minority who resolved to uphold by their presence on Tuesday the constitutional right of political assemblage. He had been taken aside as he entered the hall, by a knot of Republican journalists, informed of the crisis, and asked to arbitrate between a Regency and a Republic. To their astonishment and joy, he decided, after a few moments of solemn deliberation, for the Republic. He descended to his seat and the journalists to their bureau in the hall.—It is about noon, and it is announced that the Duchess of Orleans and her children are about to enter the house. The members, who had been conversing in agitated groups, take their places, and the President his chair. They receive the Duchess with inspiriting applause-the homage of manly hearts to a princess, a beautiful woman, in widowhood and deep distress. She simply bows, and seats herself under the tribune. M. Dupin, a confidant of the late King, announces the abdication, and states that the crown descends to the Count de Paris, and the Regency to the Duchess of Orleans. That, it is observed, is not true, as the law has fixed it upon the Duke of Nemours. During the discussion that ensues, two detachments of armed men force their way in, but they offer no violence to the Princess, who only retires nearer a door. It is even suspected by Marrast, a Republican journalist, that they are partizans of the Regency, purposely introduced; and he goes to call in "the real people," who are now clamouring at the gates. While

he is gone, Ledru Rollin, the only extreme Republican in the Chamber, proposes a Provisional Government; and Lamartine is declaring for a Republic based on universal suffrage, at the moment that the hall is invaded by the head of a column fresh from the plunder of the palace, and the burning of the throne. The Princess is led away—her children are separated from her in the tumult, and are snatched from beneath the feet of the crowd. The President and most of the Deputies prudently make their escape. A venerable Republican, Dupont de l'Eure, is placed in the chair; and Lamartine selects from the names that are hastily handed up to him, the list of a Provisional Government. Eventually the following are adopted by tumultuous acclamation-Dupont de l'Eure, Lamartine, Arago, Marie, Garnier Pages, Ledru Rollin, and Cremieux. Among other names shouted, one is very popular-that of Louis Blanc, a young man favourably known to the reading classes as the historian of the first ten years of the Orleans dynasty; to the people, as the apostle of a theory of social regeneration, the "Organization of Labour;" but his name is not put from the tribune. The Provisional Government instantly sets out for the Hôtel de Ville, makes its way thither through crowds of armed men, and the President, feeble from age, has to be lifted over dead bodies and pools of blood. In the Hôtel de Ville, it is hard to find a council chamber, and then it is impossible to preserve its privacy. Before nightfal, the principal offices are divided-Lamartine taking the Foreign Office, Rollin the Interior, Arago (as a man of science) the Marine, Cremieux (especially as a Hebrew) the Ministry of Justice; and so on-Louis Blanc is one of several named secretaries, but very quickly he is admitted as an equal in the Government- the Republic is proclaimed, subject to the acceptance of the whole people of France; with the motto, Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity "—Caussidière and Sobrier, insurgent chieftains, who have installed themselves in municipal offices, are confirmed therein because they cannot be dislodged-the Garde Mobile, a sort of ragged army, 25,000 strong, is enrolled from the ranks that must otherwise renew the insurrection from very hunger-in all sixty decrees are issued; besides the making of innumerable harangues to turbulent crowds. Night brings but a brief repose; and the next day it is only by the miraculous power of Lamartine's eloquence, and the firm support rendered by his colleagues, that the people are dissuaded from hoisting the red flag, the symbol of terrorism. On the same day, this noble band decreed, and this magnanimous people ratified, the abolition of the punishment of death, and of slavery in all the French colonies. After sixty hours of incessant toil, the members of the Government were able to separate to their offices; and Lamartine wrote his celebrated manifesto to Europe, proclaiming at once respect for existing governments, and