“My locksmith told me he had always employed four men; he has discharged three. An English pastry-cook, who has constantly employed fifteen journeymen, was about to discharge nearly all. _Every body is turning away servants, especially men, as the more expensive._ I was told that good carriage-horses had been sold for five hundred francs each. A vast number of houses are becoming tenantless; the removal of the English alone would make a visible change in this respect. And what, think you, are the feelings of all the tribe of water-carriers, washerwomen, and the humble dependents for existence on these houses? Nothing, during the three days, seemed to be more affecting and alarming than the sight of these humblest ministrants to the prime wants of life rushing from door to door, even in the quietest streets, to get their hard labour accomplished in safety. Our _porteur d’eau_ was every morning our earliest informant of the events of the night, and I was struck with the good sense and clearness of his views. ‘_Ces messieurs parlent d’égalité_,’ he said: ‘_est ce qu’ils veulent se faire porteurs d’eau? C’est absurde—ce sont des mensonges._’ (‘These gentlemen talk of equality: will they turn water-carriers? It is absurd—these are lies.’) ‘_Ils vont nous ruiner tous._’ (‘They are going to ruin us all.’) These last words I heard frequently repeated by persons of the working classes. A poor commissioner, who, for high pay, and through long _détours_, conveyed a letter for me on the 23d, came in looking aghast. ‘_Nous voilà sans maître._’ (‘Here we are without a master,’) said he. ‘_Bon Dieu! qu’est ce que nous allons devenir?_’ (‘Good God! what will become of us?’) ‘_Un pays sans maître ce n’est plus un pays._’ (‘A country without a master is no longer a country.’) ‘_Nous allons retomber dans la barbarie._’ (‘We shall fall back into barbarism.’) This, indeed, was so soon felt by all, that masters were appointed. But has that restored the feeling of reverence for authority, or of confidence in those who wield it, indispensable to civil society? “I heard with astonishment English people on the road saying, ‘Oh, all is quiet now.’ ‘All is going on very well now.’ From no Frenchman have I heard this superficial view of the case. Paris is indeed quiet enough, but it is the quiet of exhaustion, fear, distrust, and dejection. The absolute silence of the streets at night was awful. But a few nights before the 22d, I had complained of the incessant roll of carriages during this season of balls. From the night of the 26th to the 3d of March, the most retired village could not have been more utterly noiseless. Not a carriage—not a foot-fall—except at intervals the steady and silent step of the patrol of the National Guard, listened for as the sole guarantee for safety. ‘Every man,’ said a grocer, wearing the uniform of the Guard, to me in his shop, ‘must now defend his own. We have no protectors but ourselves; no police, no army.’”—_Times_, March 8, 1848.