The pupils of the Polytechnic School showed in 1814 the same patriotic feeling which had delighted Napoleon on a previous occasion. They offered for the artillery eight horses fully equipped; and immediately afterwards they petitioned to be admitted as combatants into the ranks of the French army. Napoleon made a reply which has become famous--that he was not reduced to such straits as to find it necessary to “kill his fowl with the golden eggs.” He formed, however, out of the Paris National Guard twelve batteries of artillery, three of which consisted of pupils of the Polytechnic School. On the 28th of March the pupils were entrusted with the service of twenty-eight pieces of reserve artillery, and on the 30th, during the battle of Paris, this reserve, placed across the avenue of Vincennes, held in check the enemy’s troops, who were endeavouring to enter Paris on this side in order to turn the position of the diminutive French army, fighting at Belleville and at Pantin. [Illustration: ST. STEPHEN-OF-THE-MOUNT.] On the return from Elba the Polytechnic School was again formed into a body of artillery; and it then received the only visit Napoleon paid to it throughout the Empire. With all his admiration for it, he regarded it as infected with the spirit of republicanism. Monge defended the pupils against the bad opinion entertained by the emperor, saying that, ardent Republicans when the school was first formed, they had not yet had time to become zealous Imperialists; at which Napoleon is said to have smiled. Broken up in 1816 in consequence of some act of insubordination, and reorganised towards the end of 1817 under a civilian administration, the Polytechnic School was now placed under the Ministry of the Interior. Five years later, however, in 1822, it was once more organised on a military system. Like all the students of those days, the pupils of the Polytechnic School were enthusiastic Liberals, and when the Revolution of July, 1830, broke out they joined the people and acted for the most part as officers. One of them, Vanneau by name, was killed in the attack made on the barracks of the Swiss guards in the Rue de Babylone; and afterwards, by universal desire, the name of the young man was given to a neighbouring street, which still bears it. Since then the Polytechnic has been mixed up with every important political movement that has taken place in France. On the 7th of June, 1832, many students, in spite of orders to the contrary, went out to assist at the funeral of General Lamarque, and took part in the outbreak to which it led. In 1848 the school was called out in a body to support the provisional government, which invited it, together with the Normal School and the School of Saint-Cyr, to take part in all the celebrations of the new Republic. [Illustration: INTERIOR OF CHURCH OF ST. STEPHEN-OF-THE-MOUNT.]