mong them were all
men whose names were familiar in French political circles--men of
revolutionary tendencies and of advanced opinions. I afterward
discovered they had taken advantage of Mrs. Leare's desire to be the
head of a salon to use her rooms as a convenient rendezvous. It was safe
ground on which to simmer their revolutionary cauldron. It was seething
and bubbling that night, although neither the Leares nor myself were
aware of what was brewing. The talk was all about the Banquets,
especially the impending reform banquet in the Rue Chaillot. The
gentlemen present were not exactly conspirators: they were for the most
part political reformers, who, being cut off from the usual modes of
expressing themselves through a recognized parliamentary opposition or
by the medium of petition, had devised a system of political banquets,
some fifty of which had already been held in the departments, and they
were now engaged in getting one up in Paris in the Twelfth
arrondissement.

At that time, in a population of thirty-five millions, there were but a
quarter of a million of French voters, and as in France all places (from
that of a railroad guard to a seat on the bench) were disposed of by the
government, it was very easy for ministers to control the legislature. A
reform, really needed in the franchise, was the object proposed to
themselves by the original heads of the Revolution of 1848, though when
they had set their ball in motion they could neither control it nor keep
up with it as it rolled downward.

The prevalent idea in Mrs. Leare's salon was that the banquet of the Rue
Chaillot would go off quietly, that the prefect of police would protest,
and that the affair would then pass into the law-courts, where it would
remain until all interest in the subject had passed away. One was
sensible, however, that there was a general feeling of excitement in the
atmosphere. Paris swarmed with troops, evidently under stricter
discipline than usual. People looked into each other's faces
interrogatively and read the daily papers with an anxious air.

Though I did not at the time fully appreciate what I saw, I was struck
by the business-like character of the men about me. The guests, I
thought, took very little notice of the lady of the house. I did not
then suspect that they were using her hospitality for their own
purposes, and that they felt secure in her total incapacity to
understand what they were doing. She, meantime, inten