A detachment of Gardes Françaises, coming up with two pieces of artillery which the Hôtel de Ville had allowed to be removed, gave a more serious aspect to the siege. But the name of Gardes Françaises must not give rise to misapprehension: the soldiers of the regular army under the _ancien régime_ must not be compared with those of the present day. The regiment of Gardes Françaises in particular had fallen into a profound state of disorganization and degradation. The privates were permitted to follow a trade in the city, by this means augmenting their pay. It is certain that in the majority of cases the trade they followed was that of the bully. "Almost all the soldiers in the Guards belong to this class," we read in the _Encyclopédie méthodique_, "and many men indeed only enlist in the corps in order to live on the earnings of these unfortunates." The numerous documents relating to the Gardes Françaises preserved in the archives of the Bastille give the most precise confirmation to this statement. We see, for example, that the relatives of the engraver Nicolas de Larmessin requested a _lettre de cachet_ ordering their son to be locked up in jail, where they would pay for his keep, "because he had threatened to enlist in the Gardes Françaises." From the fifteen cannon placed on the towers, not a single shot was fired during the siege. Within the château, three guns loaded with grape defended the inner drawbridge; the governor had only one of them fired, and that only once. Not wishing to massacre the mob, de Launey determined to blow up the Bastille and find his grave among the ruins. The Invalides Ferrand and Béquart flung themselves upon him to prevent him from carrying out his intention. "The Bastille was not captured by main force," says Elie, whose testimony cannot be suspected of partiality in favour of the defenders; "it surrendered before it was attacked, on my giving my word of honour as a French officer that all should escape unscathed if they submitted."