persons at an hour when the great buildings, with the moon throwing its
white light over them and everything around, must have suggested the
majesty of silence. To people who were amazed at this irrepressible
eloquence, Michel answered ingenuously: "Talking is thinking aloud.
By thinking aloud in this way I advance more quickly than if I thought
quietly by myself." This was Numa Roumestan's idea. "As for me," he
said, "when I am not talking, I am not thinking." As a matter of fact,
Michel, like Numa, was a native of Provence. In Paris there was a
repetition of this nocturnal and roving scene. Michel and his friends
had come to a standstill on the Saints-Peres bridge. They caught sight
of the Tuileries lighted up for a ball. Michel became excited, and,
striking the innocent bridge and its parapet with his stick, he
exclaimed: "I tell you that if you are to freshen and renew your corrupt
society, this beautiful river will first have to be red with blood, that
accursed palace will have to be reduced to ashes, and the huge city you
are now looking at will have to be a bare strand where the family of the
poor man can use the plough and build a cottage home."

This was a fine phrase for a public meeting, but perhaps too fine for a
conversation between friends on the Saints-Peres bridge.

This was in 1835, at the most brilliant moment of Michel's career. It
was when he was taking part in the trial of the accused men of April.
After the insurrections of the preceding year at Lyons and Paris, a
great trial had commenced before the Chamber of Peers. We are told
that: "The Republican party was determined to make use of the
cross-questioning of the prisoners for accusing the Government and for
preaching Republicanism and Socialism. The idea was to invite a hundred
and fifty noted Republicans to Paris from all parts of France. In
their quality of defenders, they would be the orators of this great
manifestation." Barb'es, Blanqui, Flocon, Marie, Raspail, Trelat and
Michel of Bourges were among these Republicans. "On the 11th of May, the
revolutionary newspapers published a manifesto in which the committee
for the defence congratulated and encouraged the accused men. One
hundred and ten signatures were affixed to this document, which was a
forgery. It had been drawn up by a few of the upholders of the scheme,
and, in order to make it appear more important, they had affixed the
names of their colleagues without their authorization. Tho