Dantès, Edmond (Fictitious character) -- Fiction; France -- History -- February Revolution, 1848
The streets of Paris were now choked with barricades--not the mere
temporary breastworks of the first and second days, which a single
charge of heavy dragoons would sweep away, but regular systematic,
scientific structures, erected apparently under the direction of
military engineers, and calculated upon every principle of art to insure
resistance. Some of them were of immense size--that, for example, at the
corner of the Rue Richelieu; some had port-holes from which protruded
the mouths of ordnance in battery; all were surmounted by a flag,
tri-color or red, and all were defended by desperate men. Some other
thoroughfares were crossed by many barricades--the Rue St. Martin, for
instance, by thirty or forty. The troops assailing these structures were
mowed down, throughout the day, in a manner which even their opponents
deemed most merciless. Instances of individual bravery on both sides
were frequent. In the Rue Mauconseil, a young man exposed himself on the
top of the barricade, time after time, firing with fatal aim, and every
time a shower of balls from the troops assailing whistled around him.
But he stood untouched, and, at length, the officer ordering the troops
to fire at him no more, he retired at once behind the breastwork. A boy
in the Rue St. Honore mounted the barricade, enveloped in a tri-color
flag, and dared the troops to fire on their colors. He descended
unharmed. An officer of the Line was summoned to yield his sword. He did
so, but first broke it in twain across his knee. The same demand was
made to a lieutenant of the Municipal Guard, with a musket at his
breast; he was bidden also to shout "Vive la Republique!" but he only
cried "Vive le Roi!" as the weapon was wrenched from his grasp! Yet he
was spared. Arms were demanded from every householder, and when given,
the gift was endorsed on the door in these words: "Here we were given
arms." One man received a sword splendidly decorated with gems upon its
scabbard and hilt. "I want only the blade!" he said, tearing it away
from its ornaments and grasping the naked steel!
At ten o'clock M. Odillon Barrot, General Lamoriciere and Horace Vernet,
the great marine artist, proceeded on horseback to the barricades to
induce the people to disperse, but all their eloquent entreaties were
received only with insults. "No truce--no tricks--no mistake this time!"
were the decisive shouts with which they were greeted. A second time, in
the Rue Richelieu, General Lamoriciere, accompanied by Moline Saint Gru
bearing a palm-branch, was equally unsuccessful. "It is too late!" was
the terrible response from the heart of the barricades, followed by a
shower of stones, one of which wounded General Lamoriciere on the hand.
A third time, in the Rue Rohan, General Gourgaud, who even promised the
abdication of the King, met with the same utter defeat, and hastily fled
from the fury of the monster now thoroughly roused.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account