the captain had said a few words to me, I was regaled with bread, sardines, and wine,--the rations for the day. The captain was a young man of six-and-twenty, with a particularly quiet, gentlemanly manner (he was, I believe, a carpet-weaver). He had been a soldier, and had served in Africa with distinction. "The account of my daily duties as a member of this company from April 10 to May 23 may be here omitted. I became orderly to one of the members of the Commune, and being supplied with a good horse (for as an Englishman I was supposed to be able to ride), I spent much of my time in carrying messages. On the morning of Tuesday, May 23, our colonel told us of the death of Dombrowski, who had been shot during the night, though particulars were not known. I was sorry to hear of his end, for he had been disposed to be kind to me, and I knew then that the cause of the Commune was utterly lost, as he was the only able man among them. The night before, we had seen such a fire as I never saw before, streaming up to the sky in two pillars of flame. I was told it was the Tuileries. The Versaillais were already within the walls of Paris, but this we in the centre of the city did not know. The news spread during the day, however, and there was a great panic in the evening. Everybody began to make preparations for flight, the soldiers being anxious to get home and change their uniforms for plain clothes. No one knew with any degree of certainty where the enemy really was, nor how far he had advanced; only one thing was certain, that the game was played out, and that _sauve qui peut_ must be the order of the day. Men, women, and children were rushing frantically about the streets, demanding news, and repeating it with a hundred variations. The whole scene was lit up by fires which blazed in all directions. At last the night gave place to dawn, and the scene was one to be remembered for a lifetime. The faces of the crowd wore different expressions of horror, amazement, and abject terror.... Early in the morning of Wednesday 24th, I, with some others, was ordered to the barricade of La Roquette.[1] My companions were very good fellows, with one exception,--a grumpy old wretch who had served in Africa, and could talk about nothing but the heat of Algeria and the chances for plunder he had let slip there. Finding nothing to do at the barricade, I tied my horse and fell asleep upon the pavement. I dreamed I was at a great dinner-party in my father's house, and could get nothing to eat, though dishes were handed to me in due course. Many times afterwards my sleeping thoughts took that direction. I really believe that there were times when I and many others would willingly have been shot, if we could have secured one good meal, When I awoke, about mid-day, in the Rue de la Roquette, I found my companions gone to the _mairie_ of the Eleventh Arrondissement, and I followed them. Our uniform was not unlike that of the troops of the line in the French army, so we