“In passing through the rue des Greffes they complained that I did not carry the red flag high enough nor unfurl it fully.  When we got to the guardhouse at the Crown Gate, the guard turned out, and the officer was commanded to follow us with his men.  He replied that he could not do that without a written order from a member of the Town Council.  Thereupon those around me told me I must write such an order, but I asked for a pen and ink; everybody was furious because I had none with me.  So offensive were the remarks indulged in by the volunteers and some soldiers of the Guienne regiment, and so threatening their gestures, that I grew alarmed.  I was hustled and even received several blows; but at length M. de Boudon brought me paper and a pen, and I wrote:—­’I require the troops to assist us to maintain order by force if necessary.’  Upon this, the officer consented to accompany us.  We had hardly taken half a dozen steps when they all began to ask what had become of the order I had just written, for it could not be found.  They surrounded me, saying that I had not written it at all, and I was on the point of being trampled underfoot, when a militiaman found it all crumpled up in his pocket.  The threats grew louder, and once more it was because I did not carry the flag high enough, everyone insisting that I was quite tall enough to display it to better advantage.

“However, at this point the militiamen with the red tufts made their appearance, a few armed with muskets but the greater number with swords; shots were exchanged, and the soldiers of the line and the National Guard arranged themselves in battle order, in a kind of recess, and desired me to go forward alone, which I refused to do, because I should have been between two fires.

“Upon this, curses, threats, and blows reached their height.  I was dragged out before the troops and struck with the butt ends of their muskets and the flat of their swords until I advanced.  One blow that I received between the shoulders filled my mouth with blood.

“All this time those of the opposite party were coming nearer, and those with whom I was continued to yell at me to go on.  I went on until I met them.  I besought them to retire, even throwing myself at their feet.  But all persuasion was in vain; they swept me along with them, making me enter by the Carmelite Gate, where they took the flag from me and allowed me to enter the house of a woman whose name I have never known.  I was spitting such a quantity of blood that she took pity on me and brought me everything she could think of as likely to do me good, and as soon as I was a little revived I asked to be shown the way to M. Ponthier’s.”

While Abbe de Belmont was carrying the red flag the militia forced the Town Councillors to proclaim martial law.  This had just been done when word was brought that the first red flag had been carried off, so M. Ferrand de Missol got out another, and, followed by a considerable escort, took the same road as his colleague, Abbe de Belmont.  When he arrived at the Calquieres, the red-tufts, who still adorned the ramparts and towers, began to fire upon the procession, and one of the militia was disabled; the escort retreated, but M. Ferrand advanced alone to the Carmelite Gate, like M. de Belmont, and like him, he too, was taken prisoner.