as may be seen, were occurring with startling
rapidity. Before the surrender of Bazaine the advance of the German army
had appeared before Paris and on September 19 the siege of that city
began. Soon it was so closely invested that food could not enter and the
only way out was by balloon. The German bombardment did little damage to
the great city, which was defended obstinately. But the Germans had a
powerful ally within, where the grisly demon of famine threatened the
defenders.

Meanwhile Gambetta, the most ardent patriot left to France, was seeking
with nervous energy to raise fresh armies in the south; Garibaldi, his
sword free from duty in Italy, had come to the aid of France; all
patriots were called to the ranks and a struggle of some importance took
place. But all this practically ceased on the 28th of January, 1871,
when an armistice brought the hopeless resistance of Paris to an end.
Almost at once the war died out on all sides, the Germans occupied all
the forts around Paris, and France lay at the mercy of Germany, after a
struggle of six months' duration.

The first siege of Paris had terminated; a second and more desperately
contested one was at hand. On March 13 the German army around Paris,
which had been given the triumph of a march into the conquered city,
set out on its return home and the authorities of the new republic
prepared to take possession of their freed capital.

They were to find the task one of unlooked-for difficulty. On March 18
the revolutionary element of the city rose _en masse_, organized under
the name of the Commune, took possession of Paris, and prepared to
defend it to the death against the leaders of the new-formed government,
whom they contemned as aristocrats.

The story of the Commune is a shameful and terrible one. Beginning in a
fraternization of the National Guard with the mob, its advent was sealed
with murder. In a contest on the 18th for the possession of some cannon
General Lecomte ordered his men to fire on the insurgents. They refused.
A gentleman standing in a crowd of angry men on the street corner said:
"General Lecomte is right." He was immediately seized and quickly
recognised as General Clement Thomas, a brave officer who had done
gallant service during the siege. This sufficed him nothing with the
mob. He and General Lecomte were at once dragged away to prison. At 4
o'clock that same day they were brought out by a party of the insurgent
National Guards, and