e cold and the
siege had continued much longer, the Prussians would have found us all
in bed. It is a far easier thing to cut down a tree than to make it
burn. Proverbs are not always true; and I have found to my bitter
experience of late that the proverb that "there is no smoke without a
fire" is untrue. The Tupper who made it never tried to burn green wood.

CHAPTER XVII.

_January 7th._

The attempt of the "Ultras" to force Trochu to resign has been a
failure. On Friday bands issuing from the outer Faubourgs marched
through the streets shouting "No capitulation!" A manifesto was posted
on the walls, signed by the delegates of the 20 arrondissements, calling
on the people to rise. At the weekly meeting of the Mayors M.
Delescluze, the Mayor of the 19th arrondissement, proposed that Trochu
and Le Flo should be called upon to resign, and that a supreme council
should be established in which the "civil element should not be
subordinated to the military element." M. Gustave Flourens published a
letter from his prison suggesting that the people should choose as their
leader a young energetic Democrat--that is to say himself. M. Felix
Pyat, on the other hand, explained that generals are tyrants, and that
the best thing would be to carry on the operations of the siege without
one. The "bombardment" is, however, still the absorbing question of the
day; and all these incipient attempts at revolution have failed. Trochu
issued a proclamation, in which he said, "The Governor of Paris will
never capitulate." M. Delescluze has resigned, and several arrests have
been made. The Government, however, owes its triumph, not so much to its
own inherent merits, as to the demerits of those who wished to supplant
it. Everyone complains of Trochu's strange inaction, and distrusts his
colleagues, who seem to be playing fast-and-loose with the Commune, and
to be anxious by a little gentle violence to be restored to private
life. The cry still is, "We will not capitulate!" and the nearer the
moment approaches that the provisions must fail, the louder is it
shouted. Notwithstanding the bitter experience which the Parisians have
had of the vanity of mere words to conjure disaster, they still seem to
suppose that if they only cry out loud enough that the Prussians cannot,
will not, shall not, enter Paris, their men of war will be convinced
that the task is beyond their powers, and go home in despair. We are
like a tribe of Africans beat