twenty-four hours' provisions in hand when the assault began. [Footnote 165: Only five francs were allowed for a bourgeois; a man of letters was granted ten; a Marshal of France obtained the maximum.] The Bastille, some time before its fall, was already under sentence of demolition, and various schemes for its disposal were before the court. One project was to destroy seven of the towers, leaving the eighth standing in a dilapidated state. On the site of the seven, a pedestal formed of chains and bolts from the dungeons and gates was to bear a statue of Louis XVI. in the attitude of a liberator, pointing with outstretched hand towards the remaining tower in ruins. But Louis XVI. was always too late, and the Place de la Bastille, with its column raised to those who fell in the Revolution of July, 1830, now recalls the second and final triumph of the people over the Bourbon kings. Some stones of the Bastille were, however, "in order that they might be trodden under foot by the people for ever," built into the new Pont Louis Seize, subsequently called Pont de la Revolution and now known as Pont de la Concorde; others were sold to speculators and were retailed at prices so high that people complained that Bastille stones were as dear as the best butcher's meat. Models of the Bastille, dominoes, inkstands, boxes and toys of all kinds were made of the material and had a ready sale all over France. Far to the west and on the opposite side of the Seine is the immense area of the Champ de Mars, where, on the anniversary of the fall of the Bastille, was enacted the fairest scene of the Revolution. The whole population of Paris, with their marvellous instinct of order and co-operation, spontaneously set to work to dig the vast amphitheatre which was to accommodate the 100,000 representatives of France, and 400,000 spectators, all united in an outburst of fraternal love and hope to swear allegiance to the new Constitution before the altar of the Fatherland. The king had not yet lost the affection of his people. As he came to view the marvellous scene an improvised bodyguard of excavators, bearing spades, escorted him about. When he was swearing the oath to the Constitution, the queen, standing on a balcony of the _Ecole militaire_, lifted up the dauphin as if to associate him in his father's pledge. Suddenly the rain which had marred the great festival ceased, the sun burst forth and flooded in a splendour of light, the altar, Bishop Talleyrand, his four hundred clergy, and the king with upraised hand. The solemn music of the _Te Deum_ mingled with the wild paean of joy and enthusiasm that burst from half a million throats.