e Eighty-three departmental flags of France; which wave or flap,
with such thankfulness as needs. Towards three o'clock, the sun beams
out again: the remaining evolutions can be transacted under bright
heavens, though with decorations much damaged. (Deux Amis, v. 143-179.)

On Wednesday our Federation is consummated: but the festivities last out
the week, and over into the next. Festivities such as no Bagdad Caliph,
or Aladdin with the Lamp, could have equalled. There is a Jousting
on the River; with its water-somersets, splashing and haha-ing: Abbe
Fauchet, Te-Deum Fauchet, preaches, for his part, in 'the rotunda of the
Corn-market,' a Harangue on Franklin; for whom the National Assembly has
lately gone three days in black. The Motier and Lepelletier tables still
groan with viands; roofs ringing with patriotic toasts. On the fifth
evening, which is the Christian Sabbath, there is a universal Ball.
Paris, out of doors and in, man, woman and child, is jigging it, to the
sound of harp and four-stringed fiddle. The hoariest-headed man will
tread one other measure, under this nether Moon; speechless nurselings,
infants as we call them, (Greek), crow in arms; and sprawl out
numb-plump little limbs,--impatient for muscularity, they know not why.
The stiffest balk bends more or less; all joists creak.

Or out, on the Earth's breast itself, behold the Ruins of the Bastille.
All lamplit, allegorically decorated: a Tree of Liberty sixty feet high;
and Phrygian Cap on it, of size enormous, under which King Arthur and
his round-table might have dined! In the depths of the background, is
a single lugubrious lamp, rendering dim-visible one of your iron cages,
half-buried, and some Prison stones,--Tyranny vanishing downwards, all
gone but the skirt: the rest wholly lamp-festoons, trees real or of
pasteboard; in the similitude of a fairy grove; with this inscription,
readable to runner: 'Ici l'on danse, Dancing Here.' As indeed had been
obscurely foreshadowed by Cagliostro (See his Lettre au Peuple Francais,
London, 1786.) prophetic Quack of Quacks, when he, four years ago,
quitted the grim durance;--to fall into a grimmer, of the Roman
Inquisition, and not quit it.

But, after all, what is this Bastille business to that of the Champs
Elysees! Thither, to these Fields well named Elysian, all feet tend. It
is radiant as day with festooned lamps; little oil-cups, like variegated
fire-flies, daintily illumine the highest leaves: trees th