“Monsieur Victor Hugo,” said he, “where are you going to sleep?”

Up to that moment I had not thought of this.

It was far from prudent to go home.

“In truth,” I answered, “I have not the least idea.”

“Will you come to my house?”

“I shall be very happy.”

He told me his mane.  It was M. de la R——.  He knew my brother Abel’s wife and family, the Montferriers, relations of the Chambaceres, and he lived in the Rue Caumartin.  He had been a Prefect under the Provisional Government.  There was a carriage in waiting.  We got in, and as Baudin told me that he would pass the night at Cournet’s, I gave him the address of M. do la R——­, so that he could send for me if any notice of the movement came from the Faubourg St. Marceau or elsewhere.  But I hoped for nothing more that night, and I was right.

About a quarter of an hour after the separation of the Representatives, and after we had left the Rue Popincourt, Jules Favre, Madier de Montajau, de Flotte, and Carnot, to whom we had sent word to the Rue des Moulins, arrived at Cournet’s, accompanied by Schoelcher, by Charamaule, by Aubry (du Nord), and by Bastide.  Some Representatives were still remaining at Cournet’s.  Several, like Baudin, were going to pass the night there.  They told our colleagues what had been settled respecting my proposition, and of the rendezvous at the Salle Roysin; only it appears that there was some doubt regarding the hour agreed upon, and that Baudin in particular did not exactly remember it, and that our colleagues believed that the rendezvous, which had been fixed for nine o’clock in the morning, was fixed for eight.

This alteration in the hour, due to the treachery of memory for which no one can be blamed, prevented the realization of the plan which I had conceived of an Assembly holding its sittings in the Faubourg, and giving battle to Louis Bonaparte, but gave us as a compensation the heroic exploits of the Ste. Marguerite barricade.

CHAPTER XX.

THE BURIAL OF A GREAT ANNIVERSARY

Such was the first day.  Let us look at it steadfastly.  It deserves it.  It is the anniversary of Austerlitz; the Nephew commemorates the Uncle.  Austerlitz is the most brilliant battle of history; the Nephew set himself this problem—­how to commit a baseness equal to this magnificence.  He succeeded.

This first day, which will be followed by others, is already complete.  Everything is there.  It is the most terrible attempt at a thrust backwards that has ever been essayed.  Never has such a crumbling of civilization been seen.  All that formed the edifice is now in ruin; the soil is strewn with the fragments.  In one night the inviolability of the Law, the Right of the Citizen, the Dignity of the Judge, and the Honor of the Soldier have disappeared.  Terrible substitutions have taken place; there was the oath, there is pergury; there was the flag, there is a rag; there was the Army, there is a band of brigands; there was Justice, there is treason; there was a code of laws, there is the sabre; there was a Government, there is a crew of swindlers; there was France, there is a den of thieves.  This called itself Society Saved.