My sacerdotal mission was ended. In returning across the Place Vendôme, I was not the witness or the object of any occurrence that merits attention. The dense line of insurgents that guarded the entrance of the Place from the Rue de la Paix opened for me to pass. The patrol, who remembered having allowed me to enter, asked no questions in permitting me to go out. I met a man in the Rue Neuve-des-Capucines who was covering a real pool of blood with sand. There was no change in the manner of the patrols: the street was still like a tomb. Nearly in front of the Crédit Foncier, a shop-keeper of respectable appearance timidly opened one of the doors of his shop, and asked permission to pass from the last patrol toward the boulevard, which was not more than fifty yards from me. He appeared so alarmed, and his face was so extremely pale, that the patrol, proud of the fear he inspired, did not fail to avail himself of so favorable an opportunity of amusing himself at the other’s expense. He questioned him with an affected solemnity which would have excited my laughter in less tragical times, addressed him a long and severe recommendation, and when the man turned, more dead than alive, toward the boulevard, the youngest of the band, who hid the malicious hilarity of a _gamin_ under the gravity of a judge, took his gun, and pointing it toward the shop-keeper, who happily was not aware of such a salute, had the air of saying: “If the rest of the bourgeoisie resemble this 142 one, Paris is certainly ours.” I was as much saddened at the dejected and disconcerted appearance of most of the inhabitants of this quarter, as I had been alarmed by the boldness and audacity displayed on the Place Vendôme by the workmen of the faubourgs, old criminals and revolutionists from all countries, who held possession of it. There was more stupor than indignation among the former. They hardly ventured to the doors of their houses, they spoke in low tones for fear of being compromised. This unfortunate attitude of the lovers of order only encouraged the energy and boldness of the enemies of society. I comprehended for the first time how a handful of factionists had been able in 1793 to terrify and decimate the better part of the community, who were ten times as numerous. The very day when the lovers of order will say to those of disorder, with the same energy and firmness as God to the waves of the sea, “Thou shalt go no further!” Paris will have no more to fear from anarchy and revolution, and France will no longer oscillate between the equally deplorable extremes of despotism and license.