to return when he found himself in safety at the mayoralty, whither he had made his way on foot. Meanwhile, some hundred unknown individuals, who gathered at the Hôtel-de-Ville, and surreptitiously made their way into one of the halls, had formed an insurrectionary Commune. On their own authority they appointed commissaries of sections, and dismissed the staff of the National Guard, who were very much in their way; but retained in office Manuel as procurator and Pétion as mayor. This new municipality, whose very existence was unknown at the palace, had just learned that Mandat, general-in-chief of the National Guard, had a document in his pocket by which Pétion authorized him to oppose force to force. It was necessary to get rid of this document at any cost. The municipality sent Mandat an order to come to the Hôtel-de-Ville. He knew nothing about the revolution that had just taken place there. And yet he hesitated to obey. A secret presentiment took possession of his soul. Finally, at the instance of Roederer, he decided, towards five in the morning, to leave the Tuileries and go to that Hôtel-de-Ville, which was to be so fatal to him. When he came before the municipality he was surprised to see new faces. He was accused of having intended to disperse "the {282} innocent and patriotic column of the people," and sentenced to be taken to the Abbey prison. It was a sentence of death. Mandat was massacred on the steps of the Hôtel-de-Ville. A pistol-shot brought him down. Pikes and sabres finished him. His body was thrown into the Seine. Such was the first exploit of the new Commune. It preluded thus the massacres of September. "Mandat's death," says Count de Vaublanc in his Memoirs, "was, beyond any doubt, the chief cause of the calamities of the day. If he had attacked the rebels as soon as they came near the palace, he could have dispersed them with ease. They took a long time to form and set off; and, being undecided and uneasy, they often halted. No troop marching from a given point in this immense city knew whether it was seconded by the rebels from other quarters, and lost much time in making sure." The second exploit of the Commune was to confine Pétion at the mayoralty under the guard of six men. A voluntary captive, this accomplice of the insurrection rejoiced at a measure which sheltered him from every danger. As M. Mortimer-Ternaux has observed: "On this fatal night, when the passion of the royalty was fulfilled, Pétion doubled the parts of Judas and Pontius Pilate. Like Judas, he went at nightfall to give the kiss of peace to Louis XVI. by assuring him of his loyalty; like the Roman governor, he proclaimed at daybreak the impotence with which he had stricken himself, and washed his hands of all that was to happen." {283}