The 9th of August the ferment was perfect, and the order was given for sounding the tocsin. At that moment the sections decided that three commissioners should be appointed in each quarter of Paris to unite with the Commune, with full powers to devise prompt means of saving the country. The insurrectionary force thus had a legal representation. This representation received at the Hôtel de Ville by the regular municipal council, on evening of August 9th, had before morning superseded it, and was the governing force of Paris. It was a transfer of power, probably with the acquiescence of the legal municipality, glad to escape from the turmoil of things. The new body, to be known as the Commune, was composed of men almost without exception unknown outside of their neighborhoods, and there only for agitation and violence. While the new Commune was settling itself at the Hôtel de Ville, the populace it represented was in motion. The force with which the Court and constitutional party attempted to control the movement was insufficient, and in part unreliable. In a few hours the leaders of the opposing force had been disposed; Mandat, the commander of the National Guards, had been murdered; Pétion had been “chained by ribbons to his wife’s side”; Louis XVI. and his family had taken refuge in the Assembly; the Swiss guards, who had attempted to defend the château, had been ordered by the King to retire to their barracks, and had been murdered as they went; the château had been invaded. The mob filled not only the Tuileries, but the _Manège_ where the Assembly sat. That body, composed the 10th of August of Girondins and Jacobins alone, the constitutionals absenting themselves, found itself under the pressure of a new force,—the populace. They had worked for fifty days to arouse it. They had allowed it to organize itself. They had permitted it to do the work of the day. But what were they going to do with it now? Could they use it? Was there not a possibility that it may use them? In any case, the objects for which the insurrection had been prepared must be attained and the suspension of Louis XVI. was voted; the Gironde ministers, Roland, Servan, and Clavière, were returned, Danton, Monge, and Lebrun being added to them. Madame Roland’s policy had been carried out to the letter; the united sections had acted; the King was out of the way; the patriots were in power. IX DISILLUSION