If this general effort had been directed by the least thought of combination, if Montmartre and the Pantheon had crossed their fires, the Versaillese army would have melted away in Paris; but the Federals, without directions, without military knowledge, saw no further than just their own quarter, or even their own streets; so that instead of 200 strategical solidary barricades, easy to defend with 7,000 or 8,000 men, hundreds were scattered about which it was impossible to arm sufficiently. The general mistake was a belief that they would be attacked from the front; while the Versaillese, thanks to their numbers, everywhere executed flank movements. In the evening the Versaillese line extended from the station of the Batignolles to the extremity of the Railway of the West on the left bank, passing by the St. Lazare Station, the Pepiniere Barracks, the English Embassy, the Palais de l'Industrie, the Corps Legislatif, the Rue de Bourgogne, the Boulevard des Invalides, and the Mont-Parnasse Station. To face the invader there were but embryo barricades. If with one effort he were to break through this line still so weak, he would surprise the centre quite disarmed. But these 130,000 men did not dare to. Soldiers and chiefs were afraid of Paris. They fancied the streets would open, the houses fall upon them; as witness the fable of the torpedoes, of the mines under the sewers, invented later on to justify their indecision.[184] On the Monday evening, masters of several arrondissements, they still trembled, fearful of some terrible surprise. They needed all the tranquility of the night to recover from their conquest, and convince themselves that the Committee of Defence, despite their boasting, had neither foreseen nor prepared anything. FOOTNOTES: [179] "Seventeen hours were required to get in 130,000 men and our numerous artillery."--_M. Thiers, Enquete sur le 18 Mars._ [180] "From this unexpected obstruction there resulted a confusion that lasted till after the passage of the troops, and might have had serious consequences. If the insurgents had then opened fire upon the Trocadero, from the batteries of Montmartre, their shells would have harassed us a great deal. But the cannon of Montmartre still kept silent. It was only a little after nine o'clock that they commenced firing; the passage was then already cleared."--_Vinoy, La Commune_, p. 130. [181] The first conflagration of the days of May, and the Versaillese have admitted that they themselves kindled it.--_Vinoy, L'Armistice et la Commune_, p. 809. [182] No deputy protested either on this day or after, or declared he had abstained from voting, neither those of the extreme Left nor those of the extreme Right. They are then, all of them equally answerable for this vote.