Forthwith, at the invitation of another deputy of the left, Jules Favre, the crowd followed Favre himself and Gambetta to the Hôtel de Ville. There at half-past four the Republic was proclaimed and the Government of National Defence declared. Its President was General Trochu, Governor of Paris and Minister of War. Of the fourteen members, all deputies either for Paris or the department of Seine, nine were the Adams’ personal friends. Gambetta was Minister of the Interior, Ernest Picard of Finance, Jules Simon of Education, Jules Favre of Foreign Affairs, Dorian of Public Works. Garnier-Pagès, Pelletan, Emmanuel Arago and Rochefort were all ministers without portfolios.[182] When the Revolution broke out Rochefort was in prison on a charge of high treason, based on his attacks on the Empire in his paper _La Lanterne_. On the afternoon of the 4th, he was liberated by the crowd and brought in triumph to the Hôtel de Ville. “The end of that day was splendid,” writes Juliette.[183] “A fresh breeze blew from the old river of Paris on to the assembled multitude. Once again the Hôtel de Ville had become _le Louvre superbe des révolutions_. The last rays of the setting sun gilded that people’s palace, played upon its windows, causing them to sparkle with a brilliance far surpassing the glitter of all the diamonds in the imperial crown.” The Revolution had passed without the shedding of a drop of blood, without a single deed of violent disorder. The forecast of a working man, whom Juliette had overheard that afternoon, had come true. “Ah, well!” he had exclaimed, looking round on the crowd,[184] “we are all here—we, the robbers, _les partageux_, the assassins! Here we are on this fine Sunday. And there will be no robbery and no assassination.... Every one is pleased, even the omnibus company; for not one of their ‛buses has been held up and they have not lost a threepence.” Indeed, there was universal rejoicing. Confidence and determination shone on all faces. Old friends met in the street and embraced one another. The fall of that oppressive _régime_ established on the 2nd of December brought intense relief. On the day after the Revolution, George Sand wrote to Mme. Adam from Nohant a letter of fervent rejoicing: _“Quelle grande chose,”_ she exclaims, _“quelle belle journée au milieu de tant de désastres! Je n’espérais pas cette victoire de la liberté sans résistance.”_[185] Even with the enemy advancing to their gates Parisians breathed again, realising that henceforth it was for _la patrie_ and not for a dynasty that they would fight.