of the three-thousand orders, by King’s Procureur M. Ethys de Corny, by Lally Tollendal, and others; knows not what to think of it, or say of it; learns that he is ’Restorer of French Liberty,’—­as a Statue of him, to be raised on the site of the Bastille, shall testify to all men.  Finally, he is shewn at the Balcony, with a Tricolor cockade in his hat; is greeted now, with vehement acclamation, from Square and Street, from all windows and roofs:—­and so drives home again amid glad mingled and, as it were, intermarried shouts, of Vive le Roi and Vive la Nation; wearied but safe.

It was Sunday when the red-hot balls hung over us, in mid air:  it is now but Friday, and ‘the Revolution is sanctioned.’  An August National Assembly shall make the Constitution; and neither foreign Pandour, domestic Triumvirate, with levelled Cannon, Guy-Faux powder-plots (for that too was spoken of); nor any tyrannic Power on the Earth, or under the Earth, shall say to it, What dost thou?—­So jubilates the people; sure now of a Constitution.  Cracked Marquis Saint-Huruge is heard under the windows of the Chateau; murmuring sheer speculative-treason.  (Campan, ii. 46-64.)

Chapter 1.5.IX.

The Lanterne.

The Fall of the Bastille may be said to have shaken all France to the deepest foundations of its existence.  The rumour of these wonders flies every where:  with the natural speed of Rumour; with an effect thought to be preternatural, produced by plots.  Did d’Orleans or Laclos, nay did Mirabeau (not overburdened with money at this time) send riding Couriers out from Paris; to gallop ‘on all radii,’ or highways, towards all points of France?  It is a miracle, which no penetrating man will call in question. (Toulongeon, (i. 95); Weber, &c. &c.)

Already in most Towns, Electoral Committees were met; to regret Necker, in harangue and resolution.  In many a Town, as Rennes, Caen, Lyons, an ebullient people was already regretting him in brickbats and musketry.  But now, at every Town’s-end in France, there do arrive, in these days of terror,—­’men,’ as men will arrive; nay, ‘men on horseback,’ since Rumour oftenest travels riding.  These men declare, with alarmed countenance, The brigands to be coming, to be just at hand; and do then—­ride on, about their further business, be what it might!  Whereupon the whole population of such Town, defensively flies to arms.  Petition is soon thereafter forwarded to National Assembly; in such peril and terror of peril, leave to organise yourself cannot be withheld:  the armed population becomes everywhere an enrolled National Guard.  Thus rides Rumour, careering along all radii, from Paris outwards, to such purpose:  in few days, some say in not many hours, all France to the utmost borders bristles with bayonets.  Singular, but undeniable,—­miraculous or not!—­But thus may any chemical liquid; though cooled to the freezing-point, or far lower, still continue liquid; and then, on the slightest stroke or shake, it at once rushes wholly into ice.  Thus has France, for long months and even years, been chemically dealt with; brought below zero; and now, shaken by the Fall of a Bastille, it instantaneously congeals:  into one crystallised mass, of sharp-cutting steel!  Guai a chi la tocca; ’Ware who touches it!