Slowly and regularly they form in line and retire along the broad alley
of the garden. At the sight of these foreigners, however, in red coats,
who had just fired on Frenchmen, the guns of the battalion stationed on
the terraces go off of their own accord, and the Swiss column divides in
two. One body of 250 men turns to the right, reaches the Assembly, lays
down its arms at the King's order, and allows itself to be shut up
in the Feuillants church. The others are annihilated on crossing the
garden, or cut down on the Place Louis XV. by the mounted gendarmerie.
No quarter is given. The warfare is that of a mob, not civilized war,
but primitive war, that of barbarians. In the abandoned palace into
which the insurgents entered five minutes after the departure of the
garrison,[2693] they kill the wounded, the two Swiss surgeons attending
to them,[2694] the Swiss who had not fired a gun, and who, in the
balcony on the side of the garden, "cast off their cartridge-boxes,
sabers, coats, and hats, and shout: 'Friends, we are with you, we are
Frenchmen, we belong to the nation!'"[2695] They kill the Swiss, armed
or unarmed, who remain at their posts in the apartments. They kill the
Swiss gate-keepers in their boxes. They kill everybody in the kitchens,
from the head cook down to the pot boys.[2696] The women barely escape.
Madame Campan, on her knees, seized by the back, sees an uplifted saber
about to fall on her, when a voice from the foot of the staircase calls
out: "What are you doing there? The women are not to be killed!" "Get
up, you hussy, the nation forgives you!"--To make up for this the nation
helps itself and indulges itself to its heart's content in the palace
which now belongs to it. Some honest persons do, indeed, carry money and
valuables to the National Assembly, but others pillage and destroy all
that they can.[2697] They shatter mirrors, break furniture to pieces,
and throw clocks out of the window; they shout the Marseilles hymn,
which one of the National Guards accompanies on a harpsichord,[2698] and
descend to the cellars, where they gorge themselves. "For more than
a fortnight," says an eye witness,[2699] "one walked on fragments of
bottles." In the garden, especially, "it might be said that they had
tried to pave the walks with broken glass."--Porters are seen seated on
the throne in the coronation robes; a trollop occupies the Queen's bed;
it is a carnival in which unbridled base and cruel instincts find plenty
of good forage and abundant litter. Runaways come back after the victory
and stab the dead with their pikes. Nicely dressed prostitutes fooling
around with naked corpses.[26100] And, as the destroyers enjoy their
work, they are not disposed to be disturbed in it. In the courts of the
Carrousel, where 1800 feet of building are burning, the firemen try four
times to extinguish the fire; "they are shot at, and threatened with
being pitched into the flames,"[26101] while petitioners appear at
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