The total number of persons confined in the Parisian prisons is so differently stated that it is no easy matter even to approximate to the truth; it is estimated by Scott (vol. ii. p. 41) at about 8000. Early on the morning of September 2, news arrived of the capture of Verdun by the Prussians. This struck a terror into Paris, by which the projectors of the massacre hastened to profit. The barriers were shut, the tocsin sounded, the alarm–gun fired. The prisons of Les Carmes, the Abbaye, and La Force, were first attacked, not in consequence of any general popular impulse; not by multitudes, such as had carried the Bastille and the Tuileries against superior arms and discipline; but by a crew of ruffians, composed partly of Marseillois, partly of the savage mob of Paris, in number not perhaps much exceeding a hundred, and goaded, it is said, with wine and spirits mixed with stimulating and maddening drugs. Armed with pikes, sabres, and similar weapons, they beset the prison doors to the sound of the Marseillois hymn, and demanded that the conspirators, as they called them, should be delivered into their hands: and the gaolers offered no resistance to their entrance. Les Carmes, the Carmelite convent, had been converted into a prison for suspected ecclesiastics. This was the first object of attack; and, without parley, or the pretence of trial or inquiry, the murderers burst in and began to fire on their victims. “Where,” it was asked, “is the Archbishop of Arles?” That prelate advanced boldly, and was cut down without his uttering a word of complaint. Others were hunted round the gardens, and shot like wild beasts; some escaped over the walls. At last, to proceed in a more orderly manner, and give less opportunity for escape, the survivors were all collected in the church, and led down two by two to be executed in the garden. The Bishop of Saintes, whose leg had been broken by a bullet, is reported to have said, “Gentlemen, I am ready to go and die, like the rest; but you see the state in which I am, my leg is broken; I beg that you will assist me, and I will go willingly to execution.” The difficulty of obtaining correct information concerning these events may be estimated from the statements of the number of ecclesiastics who perished in Les Carmes. A royalist account raises it to 1168, a republican account reduces it to 163.[74] If it were necessary to make choice of either, we should not hesitate to adopt the smaller number.