On the boulevards more barricades; some nearly finished, others scarcely commenced.  One constructed near the Porte Saint Martin looks formidable.  That spot seems destined to be the theatre of bloody scenes, of riot and revolution.  In 1852, corpses laid piled up behind the railing, and all the pavement tinged with blood.  I return home profoundly sad; I can scarcely think.—­I feel in a dream, and am tired to death; my eyelids droop of themselves; I am like one of those houses there with closed shutters.

Near the Gymnase I meet a friend whom I thought was at Versailles.  We shake hands sadly.  “When did you come back?” I ask.—­“To-day; I followed the troops.”—­Then turning back with me he tells me what he has seen.  He had a pass, and walked into Paris behind the artillery and the line, as far as the Trocadero, where the soldiers halted to take up their line of battle.  Not a single man was visible along the whole length of the quays.  At the Champ de Mars he did not see any insurgents.  The musketry seemed very violent near Vaugirard on the Pont Royal and around the Palais de l’Industrie.  Shells from Montmartre repeatedly fell on the quays.  He could not see much,—­however only the smoke in the distance.  Not a soul did he meet.  Such frightful noise in such solitude was fearful.  He continued his way under shelter of the parapet.  In one place he saw some gamins cutting huge pieces of flesh off the dead body of a horse that was lying in the path.  There must have been fighting there.  Down by the water a man fishing while two shells fell in the river, a little higher up, a yard or two from the shore.  Then he thought it prudent to get nearer to the Palais de l’Industrie.  The fighting was nearly over then, but not quite.  The Champs Elysees was melancholy in the extreme; not a soul was there.  This was only too literally true; for several corpses lay on the ground.  He saw a soldier of the line lying beneath a tree, his forehead covered with blood.  The man opened his month as if to speak as he heard the sound of footsteps, the eyelids quivered and then there was a shiver, and all was over.  My friend walked slowly away.  He saw trees thrown down and bronze lamp-posts broken; glass crackled under his feet as he passed near the ruined kiosques.  Every now and then turning his head he saw shells from Montmartre fall on the Arc de Triomphe and break off large fragments of stone.  Near the Tuileries was a confused mass of soldiery against a background of smoke.  Suddenly he heard the whizzing of a ball and saw the branch of a tree fall.  From one end of the avenue to the other, no one; the road glistened white in the sun.  Many dead were to be seen lying about as he crossed the Champs Elysees.  All the streets to the left were full of soldiery; there had been fighting there, but it was over now.  The insurgents had retreated in the direction of the Madeleine.  In many places tricolor flags were hanging from the windows, and women were smiling,