Within the Bastille the governor entrenched himself like a lion at bay. During five hours he had seen that great human ocean swell larger and larger, till its black waves stretched beyond his vision. With merciless bravery he had hurled death from tower and platform, till his heart sickened within him. But up to this time he had no thought of yielding. Now a portion of his soldiers came into his council-room, and besought him to surrender. They had scarcely spoken, when an officer from the Swiss guards rushed in. There was no sign of being relieved from without. The cannon of the insurgents was pointed against the second draw-bridge. The Swiss were waiting for orders. Must they sweep the avenue? “Surrender! surrender!” Half the garrison joined in this cry. The Swiss guards with equal force urged a more desperate defence. Delaunay answered nothing; his face was white as death, his eyes shone with some terrible resolve. He seized a burning match and hurried with it towards the powder magazine. The Swiss officer seized him by the arm, thus preventing the awful death he meditated for them and himself. Delaunay flung down the match and trod upon it. “I had forgotten that there were more lives than my own,” he said. “Wait.” He sat down by his council-table and wrote, “We have twenty thousand pounds of powder; we will blow up the garrison and all the quarters if you do not accept the capitulation.” The officer took this note and held it through an opening of the timbers. A plank was laid across the moat, and one of the insurgents attempted to span it, but was shot down; another took his place, and brought back the note which was read aloud. When the French guards pledged themselves that no harm should come to the garrison, the draw-bridge was slowly lowered, and, following their leader, a furious crowd rushed over it. The governor, pale, firm, and strengthened by the heroism of despair, came forward and received their leaders bareheaded and resting on his sword. A ruffian from the crowd menaced him with an uplifted dagger, which was wrested from his hand. Hullin and some of his followers volunteered to escort the Governor to the Hôtel de Ville, and pledged themselves to protect him from the mob. He surrendered himself to these men and left the Bastille forever. CHAPTER LX. THE PRISONERS FREE. A strange thing happened as the insurgents poured across that draw-bridge and entered the vast gloom of the prison they had conquered. Silence, like that of death, fell on them all; the pallor of ghosts settled on that sea of faces. They felt the awe of four centuries gathering around them. It was like rushing suddenly into a vast charnel house.