This famous column, one hundred and thirty-five feet high, formed on the model of Trajan's column at Rome, had been erected by Napoleon I., cast from cannon taken from his foes, and surmounted by a statue of Napoleon in his imperial robes. On May 16 this proud work of art fell, being pulled down with a tremendous crash by the aid of ropes fastened to its upper part. It is pleasant to be able to state that this fine work of art has been restored. Its attempted destruction filled the army of Versailles with a spirit of revenge, which led them, on their entering Paris a few days later, to deal with the insurrectionists with brutal and merciless energy. They had other and abundant cause for this feeling, as the reader will perceive in the recital of the later deeds of the desperate Commune. By the date now reached the army of order was rapidly gaining ground. The fort of Vauves was taken; that of Mont Rouge was dismantled; breaches were opened in the barricades, and by the 20th of May the army was in the streets and fighting its way onward against a desperate defence. The carnage was frightful; Dambrowski, a Pole and the only able general of the Commune, was killed; prisoners on both sides were shot down without mercy; there were barricades in almost every street and these were hotly defended, the courage of despair in their defenders making the progress of the besieging army a slow and bloody one. The rest of the story is all blood and horror. The desperate leaders of the Commune determined that, if they must perish, Paris should be their funeral pyre. On the night of May 24 the city became a scene of incendiary rage. The Hotel-de-Ville was in flames; the Palace of the Tuileries was burning like a great furnace; the Palace of the Legion of Honor, the Ministry of War, the Treasury were lurid volcanoes of flames; on all sides the torch had been applied. Not only these great public buildings, but many private houses were consigned to the flames. All the sewers beneath Paris had been strewn with torpedoes, bombs, and inflammable materials, connected with electric wires, and the catacombs in the eastern quarter of the city were similarly prepared. It was the intention of the desperate revolutionists to blow up the city, but fortunately, before their preparations were completed, the army of order was in control and sappers and miners were sent underground to cut the electric wires leading to these mines of death-dealing explosives. But the capture of the city came too late to save the lives of many of the "hostages" whom the Commune had sent to prison. Not content with burning the architectural monuments of the city, as the last effort of baffled rage they condemned these innocent victims of their wrath to death. On Wednesday, May 24, the venerable archbishop and five others of the imprisoned priests were taken from their cells and shot to death. On Thursday fifty more, priests and others, were similarly slaughtered.