“To describe this siege of the Bastile (thought to be one of the most important in history) perhaps transcends the talent of mortals.  Could one but, after infinite leading, get to understand so much as the plan of the building!  But there is open esplanade at the end of the Rue Saint-Antoine; there are such Fore-courts, Cour avance, Cour de l’Orme, arched gateway, (where Louis Tournay now fights,) then new drawbridges, dormant bridges rampart-bastions, and the grim Eight Towers:  a labyrinthic mass, high-frowning there, of all ages, from twenty years to four hundred and twenty; beleaguered, in this its last hour, as we said, by mere chaos come again!  Ordnance of all calibres; throats of all capacities; men of all plans, every man his own engineer; seldom, since the war of pigmies and cranes, was there seen so anomalous a thing.  Half-pay Elie is home for a suit of regimentals; no one would heed him in coloured clothes:  half-pay Hulin is haranguing Gardes Francaises in the Place de Greve.  Frantic patriots pick up the grape-shots; bear them, still hot, (or seemingly so,) to the Hotel de Ville:—­Paris, you perceive, is to be burnt!—­Paris wholly has got to the acme of its frenzy; whirled, all ways, by panic madness.

“Let conflagration rage of whatsoever is combustible!  Guard-rooms are burnt, Invalides’ mess-rooms.  A distracted ‘peruke-maker with two fiery torches’ is for burning ’the saltpetres of the arsenal;’ had not a woman run screaming—­had not a patriot, with some tincture of natural philosophy, instantly struck the wind out of him, (butt of musket on pit of stomach,) overturned barrels, and stayed the devouring element.

“Blood flows; the aliment of new madness.  The wounded are carried into the houses of the Rue Cerisuie; the dying leave their last mandate not to yield till the accursed stronghold fall.  And yet, alas, how fall?  The walls are so thick!  Deputations, three in number, arrive from the Hotel de Ville.  These wave their town-flag in the gateway, and stand rolling their drum; but to no purpose.  In such crack of doom De Launay cannot hear them, dare not believe them; they return with justified rage, the whew of lead still singing in their ears.  What to do?  The firemen are here, squirting with their fire-pumps on the Invalides’ cannon, to wet the touch-holes; they unfortunately cannot squirt so high, but produce only clouds of spray.  Individuals of classical knowledge propose catapults.  Santerre, the sonorous brewer of the suburb Saint Antoine, advises rather that the place be fired, by a ’mixture of phosphorus and oil of turpentine, spouted up through forcing pumps.’  O Spinola Santerre, hast thou the mixture ready?  Every man his own engineer!  And still the fire-deluge abates not:  even women are firing, and Turks; at least one woman (with her sweetheart) and one Turk.  Gardes Francaises have come; real cannon, real cannoniers.  Usher Maillard is busy; half-pay