ng them; but if
the prisoners are to be believed, the irrepressible Cluseret has again
risen to the surface, and is the heart and soul of the defence. As the
position of the Insurgents becomes desperate, it seems to produce a
greater ferocity on both sides. The rebels neither ask nor give quarter;
they have made up their minds that death, whether as combatants or as
prisoners, is their only alternative, and men and women seem to be
lashed up to a frenzy which has converted them into a set of wild beasts
caught in a trap, and rendering their extermination a necessity. I went
yesterday to the Jardin des Plantes, as the entire left bank of the
Seine is now in the hands of the Government troops, and found M.
Decaisne, the celebrated botanical professor, still safe and sound,
after having passed through three days of unparalleled suspense. On
Wednesday the _rappel_ had been beaten by the Insurgents, and notice was
publicly given that the Pantheon was to be blown up at 2 o'clock. The
result was a general "stampede" of the inhabitants in an agony of terror
and dismay. For two or three hours women and children came pouring out
of the doomed quarter, unable to save any of their property, and not
even yet assured that they had escaped the limits of the explosion. At 5
o'clock no explosion had occurred, and the rumour spread that the
attempt had failed for want of a sufficient quantity of powder. I told
you how the Pantheon was saved; the people went back to their houses,
only to witness severe street fighting, the result of which was to drive
the Insurgents slowly across the river, where they made a fierce stand
at a _tete du pont_ erected at the end of the bridge of Austerlitz. This
had only been carried the evening before my visit to it, and bore all
the marks of an actual battlefield. Here were eight or ten bodies strewn
behind the barricade, with groups of women and young children gathered
round inspecting them, and lifting, with a morbid curiosity, the cloths
which had been thrown over them to conceal their distorted countenances.
These men had been killed in hard fighting, men and accoutrements were
strewn thickly around, the houses were smashed and riddled with shot.
The barricade, a formidable earthwork and battery, was pounded into a
mere heap--everything betokened a bitter struggle; and, indeed, I had
already heard from a Staff officer that the Line had lost more heavily
at this point than elsewhere. Passing along the sid