But nothing can deprive Lamartine of the pacific glory his due from several extraordinary feats of eloquence achieved by him, at imminent risk to himself, on behalf of mankind. A mob of forty thousand Parisian fanatics roared into the street before the Hotel de Ville to compel the Provisional Government sitting there to adopt the red flag as the ensign of the republic. This meant nothing less than a new reign of terror for France. Lamartine, single-handed, met the wild beast to its teeth, and with one stroke of the sword that went forth from his mouth laid it tamed at his feet. "The red flag you bring us," cried the orator to the mob, he shining the while resplendent in a personal beauty touched with the gleam of genius and glorified with the consecration of courage--like a descended Apollo, the rattling quiver borne on his shoulder--"The red flag you bring us," said he, "has only gone round the Champ de Mars, trailed in the blood of the people--in 1791 and in 1793; while the tricolor has gone round the world, with the name, the glory, and the liberty of our country." This eloquent condensation of history, untremblingly shot, at close quarters, full in the face of those wild-eyed insurgents, felled them, as if it had been a ball from a cannon. But ranks from behind still pressed forward with menacing cries. "Down with Lamartine!" "Down with the time-server!" "Off with his head! His head! His head! Lamartine's head!" The brandished weapons were in Lamartine's very face. But that gentle blood never blenched. "My head, citizens? You want my head? Indeed, but I wish you had it, every one of you. If Lamartine's head were now on each pair of shoulders among you, you would be wiser than you are, and the revolution would go on more prosperously." The mob was in Lamartine's hand again, taken captive with a jest. It is generally granted that Lamartine saved the nation from a new reign of terror. But eloquence is not statesmanship; and Lamartine, weighed in the balance, was found wanting. He served at last only to hand over the state to Louis Napoleon, first president, and then emperor.