er of Deputies with
banners flying. One of the latter was a red-and-white striped flannel
petticoat, fastened to a tremendously long pole. I had no choice, and if
at that moment my friends had seen me they might have easily imagined
that I had become one of the leaders of the revolutionary mob. We took
by the Quai de la Megisserie, and just before the Pont des Arts there
was a momentary halt. The vanguard, which I was apparently leading, had
decided to turn to the right; in other words, to visit the abode of the
hated tyrant. Had I belonged to the main division, I should have
witnessed a really more important scene, from the historical point of
view; as it was, I witnessed--

THE SACKING OF THE TUILERIES.

The idea that "there is a divinity that hedgeth round a king" seemed, I
admit, preposterous enough at that moment; but I could not help being
struck with its partial truth on seeing the rabble invade the palace.
When I say the rabble, I mean the rabble, though there were a great many
persons whom it would be an insult to class as such, and who from sheer
curiosity, or because they could not help themselves, had gone in with
them. The doors proved too narrow, and those who could not enter by that
way, entered by the windows. The whole contingent of the riff-raff, male
and female, weltering in the adjacent streets--and such streets!--was
there. Well, for the first ten minutes they stood positively motionless,
not daring to touch anything. It was not the fear of being caught
pilfering and punished summarily that prevented them. The minority which
might have protested was so utterly insignificant in numbers, as to make
action on their part impossible. No, it was neither fear nor shame that
stayed the rabble's hands; it was a sentiment for which I can find no
name. It was the consciousness that these objects had belonged to a
king, to a royal family, which made them gaze upon them in a kind of
superstitious wonder. It did not last long. We were on the ground floor,
which mainly consisted of the private apartments of the household of
Louis-Philippe. We were wandering, or rather squeezing, through the
study and bedroom of the King himself, through the sitting-rooms of the
princes and princesses. I do not think that a single thing was taken
from there at that particular time. But as if the atmosphere their
rulers had breathed but so very recently became too oppressive, the
crowd swayed towards the vestibule, and ascended t