I had no time to notice more, and at the moment I did not perceive that my left-hand neighbour, Colonel Rieussec, was killed, that Heymes’ clothes were riddled with bullets and his nose carried away, nor that my own horse was wounded.  All I saw was my father holding his left arm, and saying to me over his shoulder, “I’m hit!” And so he was:  one bullet had grazed his forehead, another spent one had given him the blow of which he complained, and a third had passed through his horse’s neck.  But that we only knew afterwards, and it was only afterwards too that we learnt the instrument of the crime had been an infernal machine.  Our first thought was that the firing would go on, so I struck spurs into my horse, and seizing my father’s by the bridle, while my two brothers struck it behind with their swords, we led him swiftly through the scene of immense confusion that ensued—­horses riderless, or bearing wounded men, swaying in their seats, broken ranks, and people in blouses,, who rushed upon the King, to touch him or his horse, with frantic shouts of “Long live the King!” As we retired, I just saw the taking by assault of the house whence the discharge had come.  The young aides-de-camp had dismounted, leaving their horses loose, and with the Municipal Guards and the police they scaled the house and the one next door (the Cafe Barfetti), climbing on to the verandah and smashing in the windows.  Then the review began again.  We had ascertained the King was not wounded, nor we ourselves, but we were not aware as yet either of the great number or of the names of the victims.  Hereupon M. Thiers appeared beside us, with his white kerseymere trousers covered with blood.  All he said to us was, “The poor Marshal!”

“Whom do you mean?”

“Mortier!  He fell dead across me, crying out, ‘Oh, my God!’”

We reckoned ourselves up as we went along.  Forty-two dead or wounded:  dead—­Marshal Mortier, General Lachasse de Verigny, Colonels Raffet and Rieussec, Captain Willatte, aide-de-camp to the Minister of War, seven others, and two women; wounded—­Generals Heymes, Comte de Colbert, Pelet, Blin, and many more.  The Due de Broglie was hit full in the chest by a bullet that flattened out on his star of the Legion of Honour.

It was not far from the scene of the crime to the farthest end of the line of troops, so the procession soon retraced its steps.  The roadway where the blow had been struck was nothing but a pool of blood.  The wounded and almost all the dead had been carried away, and I only saw one corpse, flat on its face in the mud, among the dead horses, but all the blood about frightened our horses so that we had hard work to get on.

On the square of the Chateau d’Eau a huge and furious crowd surging round the station house, which was protected by numerous Municipal Guards, showed us the assassin, or one of them, had been arrested.  The review was concluded, and my father’s self-control was sorely tried by the unanimity and fervour of the acclamations of which he was the object from all sides, from soldiers and civilians alike.  It is unnecessary to add that we did not see any more red carnations.