red that a
number of actors should be armed. To command men thus equipped there
were extemporary generals, whose epaulets were obtained from the
wardrobe of the Opera Comique. The students of the Polytechnic were, as
usual, on the alert to practise whatever they had learned of military
science; the younger sort entering into the war with the same spirit
that other schoolboys partake of any minor mischief that is going
forward. A student of the Polytechnic is standing on the left bank of
the river; he has a musket, but no ammunition. A fellow-student, a lad
of fifteen, has a packet of cartridges, but no musket: "You shall share
them," said he, showing his treasure, "if you will lend me the gun to
shoot my half." A party of the royal guard were coming over the bridge.
He started with the gun _to have his shots_. He was swept off with
others by the fire of the military.

On one side comes a party led by a violin, women applauding. But the
women do more than applaud. They carry great paving-stones to the top of
the house, to be thence precipitated on the heads of the soldiers; they
tend the wounded, they bruise charcoal for gunpowder.

There was, no doubt, some severe fighting during the Three Days; but,
generally speaking, the military seem to have entered into the contest
with reluctance. Some instances are here given of singular forbearance
on their part. At a time when, in certain quarters of Paris, each house
was converted into a sort of fortress whence the military was assailed,
three men had placed themselves behind a stack of chimneys, and had,
from this shelter, directed a destructive fire on the troops. They were
at length discovered, and a cannon was levelled against the chimney.
But, before firing, the gunner made signal to the men to escape,
contenting himself with demolishing their breastwork. As another company
of soldiers, led by its officer, was marching through the streets, one
of the mob rushed forward, and, with a mad audacity, struck the officer
on the head with a bar of iron. He staggered, and his face overflowed
with blood; but he still had strength enough to raise his sword to put
aside the muskets of his men, who were in the act of firing on the
assailant.

We have here a vivid description of the taking of the Tuileries by the
populace. Some amused themselves by mutilating the statues of kings, or
by firing at the portraits of such of the marshals as they considered to
have been guilty of treason