Truly this change in the attitude of the Government is at once strange and delightful.  No later than yesterday their language was quite different.  The manner in which the majority received the mayors did not lead us to expect a termination so favourable to the wishes of all concerned.  But this is all past, let us not recriminate.  Let us rather rejoice in our present good fortune, and try and forget the dangers which seemed but now so imminent.  I hear from all sides that the Deputies of the Seine and the mayors, fully empowered, are busy concluding the last arrangements.  Municipal elections are talked of, for the 2nd April; thus every cause for discontent is about to disappear.  Capital!  Paris is satisfied.  Shops re-open.  The promenades are crowded with people; the Place Vendome alone does not brighten with the rest, but it soon will.  The weather is lovely, people accost each other in the streets with a smile; one almost wonders they do not embrace.  Is to-day Friday?  No, it is Sunday.  Bravo!  Assembly.

FOOTNOTES: 

[Footnote 20:  At the same time that the proclamation of Admiral Saisset encouraged the partizans of the Assembly, proofs were not wanting of the poverty of the Commune in money, as well as men:  a new loan obtained from the Bank of France, which had already advanced half a million of francs, and the military nominations which raised Brunel, Eudes, and Duval from absolute obscurity to the rank of general.  These were indications decidedly favourable to the party of order.]

XVI.

On the ground-floor of the house of my neighbour there is an upholsterer’s workshop.  The day before yesterday the master went out to fetch some work, and this morning he had not yet returned.  In an agony of apprehension his wife went everywhere in search of him.  His body has just been found at the Morgue with a bullet through its head.  Some say he was walking across the Rue de la Paix on his way home, and was shot by accident; but the Journal Officiel announces that this poor man, Wahlin, was a national guard, assassinated by the revolvers of the manifestation.  Whom are we to believe?  Anyhow, the man is to be buried tomorrow, and his poor wife is a widow.

XVII.

What is the meaning of all this!  Are we deceiving ourselves, or being deceived?  We await in vain the consummation of Admiral Saisset’s promises.  In officially announcing that the Assembly had acceded to the just demands of the mayors and deputies, did he take upon himself to pass delusive hopes as accomplished facts?  It seems pretty certain now that the Government will make no concessions, that the proclamation is only waste paper, and that the Provisional Commander of the National Guard has been leading us into error—­with a laudable intention doubtless—­or else has himself been deceived likewise.  The united