The Commune has seized the silver ornaments and other valuables of the
Church of the Trinity. All the other churches of Paris will shortly be
treated in a similar manner, and will then be closed.
All arrests and requisitions are being carried out by Flourens's corps
of Avengers.
The demolition of the Expiatory Chapel was commenced to-day.
The gate at Point du Jour is destroyed.
Yesterday evening two battalions of troops carried the Ory Farm and
Plichon House, near Fort Montrouge, at the point of the bayonet. The
Federalists had about 400 killed and wounded, and lost 42 prisoners,
including a Chief of Battalion. The troops also captured a flag, but
subsequently evacuated the conquered positions, as they were too much
exposed to the fire of the enemy. The loss of the Versailles troops was
small.
* * * * *
THE VENDOME COLUMN.
Foul is the bird that soils her own nest! As though they had not
suffered enough of mortification and defeat at the hands of the enemy,
the Parisians have succeeded in emptying the cup of disgrace to the
dregs by dragging down the monument of their military glory, amid hoots
and hisses, and toppling over the effigy of their greatest soldier-hero
on to a bed of mire, at the same time publicly tearing the tricoloured
national flag which has for so many years led their armies to victory.
Upon the official announcement some days back that the Vendome Column
was to be sacrificed as an insult to the principles of fraternity,
everybody laughed and thought it a good joke, never believing that the
plan would be carried out, even in spite of the ominous scaffoldings and
curtains which rose around its base. A few days later we were told that
it had been sawn through, and that a solemn Festival would be held to
commemorate this new display of liberty. We thought the party of Order
would protest; that the veterans of the Invalides would make a movement;
that the mass of the population would insist upon the abandonment of
such a piece of folly. But we forgot the state of coma into which
respectable Paris has fallen, and that those who had allowed themselves
to be ground down by a tyrannical few would scarcely bestir themselves
in defence of their public monuments. It became apparent that the column
was really doomed, and the Rue de la Paix was crowded by an expectant
multitude at about 3 o'clock on Monday afternoon; the balconies were
filled with ladies; all the windows were pasted with paper to neutralize
the expected concussion, while cake and newspaper vendors and _marchands
de coco_ plied a busy trade, and elbowed their way about among the
people down below. Three ropes had been fastened round the top of the
column beneath the statue, communicating with a crazy-looking windlass
and anchor placed in the centre of the road at the entrance of the Rue
Neuve des Capucines, and a long narrow dung heap filled with sand and
branches had been spread in the square to deaden the shock of the
falling mass.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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