a woman of lofty
intellect, has failed miserably in her attempt to rehabilitate
Bonaparte, for the simple reason that whatever one may do, the
death-roll reappears through this whitewashing.

No! no! no extenuation whatever is possible. Unfortunate Bonaparte. The
blood is drawn. It must be drunk.

The deed of the 4th of December is the most colossal dagger-thrust that
a brigand let loose upon civilization has ever effected, we will not say
upon a people, but upon the entire human race. The stroke was most
monstrous, and struck Paris to the ground. Paris on the ground is
Conscience, is Reason, is all human liberty on the ground; it is the
progress of centuries lying on the pavement; it is the torch of Justice,
of Truth, and of Life reversed and extinguished. This is what Louis
Bonaparte effected the day when he effected this.

The success of the wretch was complete. The 2d of December was lost;
the 4th of December saved the 2d of December. It was something like
Erostratus saving Judas. Paris understood that all had not yet been told
as regards deeds of horror, and that beneath the oppressor there was the
garbage-picker. It was the case of a swindler stealing Cesar's mantle.
This man was little, it is true, but terrifying. Paris consented to this
terror, renounced the right to have the last word, went to bed and
simulated death. Suffocation had its share in the matter. This crime
resembled, too, no previous achievements. Even after centuries have
passed, and though he should be an Aeschylus or a Tacitus, any one
raising the cover would smell the stench. Paris resigned herself, Paris
abdicated, Paris surrendered; the novelty of the treason proved its
chief strength; Paris almost ceased to be Paris; on the next day the
chattering of this terrified Titan's teeth could be heard in the
shadows.

Let us lay a stress upon this, for we must verify the laws of morality.
Louis Bonaparte remained, even after the 4th of December, Napoleon the
Little. This enormity still left him a dwarf. The size of the crime does
not change the stature of the criminal, and the pettiness of the
assassin withstands the immensity of the assassination.

Be that as it may, the Pigmy had the better of the Colossus. This
avowal, humiliating as it is, cannot be evaded.

Such are the blushes to which History, that greatly dishonored one, is
condemned.

THE FOURTH DAY--THE VICTORY.

CHAPTER I.

WHAT HAPPENED DURING THE NIGHT--THE RUE