In the Provisional Government itself there were two, if not three, parties,--the party of order, headed by Lamartine; the Socialists, or labor party, headed by Louis Blanc; and the Red Republicans, or Anarchists, headed by Ledru-Rollin. The latter was for adopting the policy of putting out of office all men who had not been always republicans. Lamartine, on the contrary, said that any man who loved France and desired to serve her was not incapacitated from doing so by previous political opinions. Elections for a Constitutional Assembly, which was to confirm or to repudiate the Provisional Government, were held on March 24, and the new Assembly was to meet early in May. Meantime all kinds of duties and anxieties accumulated on Lamartine. The Polish, Hungarian, Spanish, German, and Italian exiles in Paris were all anxious that he should espouse their causes against their own Governments. He assured them that this was not the mission of the Second French Republic, whatever might have been that of the First, and that the cause of European liberty would lose, not gain, if France, with propagandist fervor, embroiled herself with the monarchical powers. A deputation of Irishmen, under Smith O'Brien, waited upon him to beg the assistance of fifty thousand French troops in Ireland, "to rid her of the English." Lamartine peremptorily refused, saying: "When one is not united by blood to a people, it is not allowable to interfere in its affairs with the strong hand." Smith O'Brien and his followers, deeply mortified, repaired at once to Ledru-Rollin's Red Republican Club, where they were loudly applauded, and Lamartine condemned. Meantime there were disturbances everywhere. Men out of employment, excited by club orators, were ready for any violence. At Lyons they destroyed the hospitals and orphan asylums, out of mere wantonness. One afternoon Lamartine received news that the soldiers at the Invalides, dissatisfied with General Petit, their commander, had dragged him to the street, placed him on a cart, and were carrying him thus around Paris. On foot he rushed to the rescue, trusting to his powers of haranguing the multitude; but luckily the general had been released before his arrival. There is but one step from the sublime to the ridiculous. We smile at the spectacle of the ruler of France rushing on foot, through dim streets, after a cart he could not find. General Petit was that officer of the Old Guard whom Napoleon had embraced when he took leave of his beloved corps at Fontainebleau. Lamartine re-established him as commander at the Invalides, and the mutiny was put down. On the night of the first day of the Provisional Government, a mob having demanded that the red flag of Communism should be substituted for the tricolor, Lamartine replied,--