me attacks on Fort Issy; had I had the
smallest military force at my command, I would have punished them
for it.

"The garrison, badly commanded, took flight; the officers
deliberated, and sent away from the fort Captain Dumont, an
energetic man, who had been ordered to command them. Still
deliberating, they evacuated the fort, after having stupidly talked
of blowing it up,--as difficult a thing for them to do as to defend
it.

[Illustration: DELESCLUZE, DELEGATE OF WAR.[82]]

"Even that was not enough. Yesterday, when every one ought to have
been at work or fighting, the chiefs were deliberating upon another
system of organisation from that which I had adopted, so as to make
up for their want of forethought and authority. The results of their
council were a project, when we want men, and a declaration of
principles, when we wanted acts.

"My indignation brought them back to other thoughts, and they
promised me for to-day the largest force they could possibly muster,
--an organised one of not more than 12,000 men. With these I undertook
to march on the enemy. These men were to muster at eleven o'clock: it
is now one, and they are not ready, and the promised 12,000 has
dwindled to about 7,000, which is not at all the same thing.

"Thus, the utter uselessness of the artillery committee prevented
the organization of the artillery; the hesitation of the Central
Committee stopped all arrangements; the petty discussions of the
officers, paralyses the concentration of the troops.

"I am not a man to mind having recourse to violence. Yesterday,
while the chiefs discussed, a company of men with loaded rifles
awaited in the court. But I did not want to take upon myself the
initiative of so energetic a measure, or draw upon myself the odium
of such executions as would have been necessary to extricate
obedience and victory from such a chaos. Even if I had been
protected by the publicity of my acts, I need not have given up my
position.

"But the Commune has not had the courage to confront publicity.
Twice I wished to give some necessary explanations, and twice, in
spite of me, it insisted on a secret council.

"My predecessor was wrong to remain in so absurd a position.

"Enlightened by his example, and knowing that the strength of a
revolutionary, only consists in the cl