"Citizens," he said, addressing the Sectionists under his orders, "you are for the most part married men and fathers of families; I am, therefore, responsible for more lives than yours; as much as I should like to return death for death to these human tigers who have guillotined my father and shot my brother, I command you, in the names of your wives and children, not to fire first. But if our enemies fire a single shot--as you see, I am ten feet in front of you--the first who fires from their ranks perishes by my hand." These words were uttered amid the most profound silence; for before speaking Morgan had raised his sword to impose silence, and neither his own men nor the patriots had lost a syllable of what he said. Nothing could have been easier than to have replied to these words with a triple volley, the first from the right, the second from the left, and the third from the Rue Vivienne, in which case this would have amounted merely to pure bravado. Exposed like a target to the bullets, Morgan would necessarily have fallen. The astonishment was great when, instead of the expected volley, Laporte, after consulting with General Menou, advanced toward Morgan, and the general ordered his men to ground arms. The order was promptly obeyed. But the astonishment increased, when, after exchanging a few words with Laporte, Morgan said: "I am here only to fight, and because I thought there was to be fighting. When it comes to compliments and concessions, the affair passes into the vice-president's hands, and I will retire." And returning his sword into the scabbard, he withdrew into the crowd, where he was soon lost. The vice-president advanced in his stead. After a conference, which lasted about ten minutes, a portion of the Sectional troops marched off, turning a corner of the convent to regain the Rue Montmartre, and the Republican troops retired to the Palais Royal. But scarcely had the troops of the Convention disappeared before the Sectional troops, led by Morgan, reappeared, crying with one accord: "Down with the Two-thirds! Down with the Convention!" This cry, starting at the convent of the Daughters of Saint-Thomas, spread like wild-fire all over Paris. Two or three churches, which had retained their bells, began to sound the tocsin. This sinister sound, which had not been heard for more than four years, produced an effect more terrible than the booming of cannon. It was the coming of a religious and political reaction, wafted as if upon the wings of the wind. It was eleven o'clock at night when the unwelcome sound, together with word of Menou's advance and its result, reached the hall where the Convention was in session. All the deputies swarmed into the room, questioning each other, and unable to believe that the positive command to surround and disarm the Section Le Peletier had been disobeyed, and converted into a friendly interview at the end of which both parties had gone their ways.