"Be it so," continued he, "but listen to me. You run, you yourself personally, great dancer. Of all the men in the Assembly you are the one whom the President hates the most. You have from the height of the Tribune nicknamed him, 'Napoleon the Little.' You understand that will never be forgotten. Besides, it was you who dictated the appeal to arms, and that is known. If you are taken, you are lost. You will be shot on the spot, or at least transported. Have you a safe place where you can sleep to-night?" I had not as yet thought of this. "In truth, no," answered I. He continued, "Well, then, come to my house. There is perhaps only one house in Paris where you would be in safety. That is mine. They will not come to look for you there. Come, day or night, at what hour you please, I will await you, and I will open the door to you myself. I live at No. 5, Rue d'Alger." I thanked him. It was a noble and cordial offer. I was touched by it. I did not make use of it, but I have not forgotten it. They cried out anew, "Read the decree! Sit down! sit down!" There was a round table before the fire place; a lamp, pens, blotting-books, and paper were brought there; the members of the Committee sat down at this table, the Representatives took their places around them on sofas, on arm-chairs, and on all the chairs which could be found in the adjoining rooms. Some looked about for Napoleon Bonaparte. He had withdrawn. A member requested that in the first place the meeting should declare itself to be the National Assembly, and constitute itself by immediately appointing a President and Secretaries. I remarked that there was no need to declare ourselves the Assembly, that we were the Assembly by right as well as in fact, and the whole Assembly, our absent colleagues being detained by force; that the National Assembly, although mutilated by the _coup d'état_, ought to preserve its entity and remain constituted afterwards in the same manner as before; that to appoint another President and another staff of Secretaries would be to give Louis Bonaparte an advantage over us, and to acknowledge in some manner the Dissolution; that we ought to do nothing of the sort; that our decrees should be published, not with the signature of a President, whoever he might be, but with the signature of all the members of the Left who had not been arrested, that they would thus carry with them full authority over the People, and full effect. They relinquished the idea of appointing a President. Noël Parfait proposed that our decrees and our resolutions should be drawn up, not with the formula: "The National Assembly decrees," etc.; but with the formula: "The Representatives of the People remaining at liberty decree," etc. In this manner we should preserve all the authority attached to the office of the Representatives of the People without associating the arrested Representatives with the responsibility of our actions. This formula had the additional advantage of separating