e of that Federation day, had
lain down, say directly after the Blessing of Talleyrand; and, reckoning
it all safe now, had fallen composedly asleep under the timber-work of
the Fatherland's Altar; to sleep there, not twenty-one years, but as
it were year and day. The cannonading of Nanci, so far off, does not
disturb him; nor does the black mortcloth, close at hand, nor the
requiems chanted, and minute guns, incense-pans and concourse right over
his head: none of these; but Peter sleeps through them all. Through one
circling year, as we say; from July 14th of 1790, till July the 17th of
1791: but on that latter day, no Klaus, nor most leaden Epimenides,
only the Dead could continue sleeping; and so our miraculous Peter Klaus
awakens. With what eyes, O Peter! Earth and sky have still their joyous
July look, and the Champ-de-Mars is multitudinous with men: but the
jubilee-huzzahing has become Bedlam-shrieking, of terror and revenge;
not blessing of Talleyrand, or any blessing, but cursing, imprecation
and shrill wail; our cannon-salvoes are turned to sharp shot; for
swinging of incense-pans and Eighty-three Departmental Banners, we have
waving of the one sanguinous Drapeau-Rouge.--Thou foolish Klaus! The one
lay in the other, the one was the other minus Time; even as Hannibal's
rock-rending vinegar lay in the sweet new wine. That sweet Federation
was of last year; this sour Divulsion is the self-same substance, only
older by the appointed days.

No miraculous Klaus or Epimenides sleeps in these times: and yet, may
not many a man, if of due opacity and levity, act the same miracle in a
natural way; we mean, with his eyes open? Eyes has he, but he sees not,
except what is under his nose. With a sparkling briskness of glance, as
if he not only saw but saw through, such a one goes whisking, assiduous,
in his circle of officialities; not dreaming but that it is the whole
world: as, indeed, where your vision terminates, does not inanity begin
there, and the world's end clearly declares itself--to you? Whereby
our brisk sparkling assiduous official person (call him, for instance,
Lafayette), suddenly startled, after year and day, by huge grape-shot
tumult, stares not less astonished at it than Peter Klaus would have
done. Such natural-miracle Lafayette can perform; and indeed not he only
but most other officials, non-officials, and generally the whole French
People can perform it; and do bounce up, ever and anon, like amazed
Se