The group which had opposed the entrance of Lafayette had gone and reformed themselves a little further off. They were joined by all the blackguards of the quarter.
At the moment when, after a roll of drums, M. Bailly commenced his declaration, a shower of stones fell around him. A gun was fired behind him at the same time, and wounded a dragoon.
Bailly gave the order to fire a round of blank cartridge in the air. The order was executed. This inoffensive discharge injured no one, but had the effect of making Lafayette think that it was real.
The promenaders nearly all rushed towards the altar of the country, fancying that they, as simple spectators, could not be fired upon without there having first been a summons to disperse.
At this moment, the Champ de Mars was invaded by cavalry.
The promenaders vainly search for an issue to re-enter Paris.
At all sides, nothing but troubles present themselves to our view; at the Military College, at Gros Caillon, at the entrance to the wood.
Almost immediately the paid guards made an offensive movement towards the altar. Abandoning the hostile group, which continued to shower stones on their heads, they dashed themselves distractedly and furiously against the altar; and, without an attack, without provocation or resistance, fired on this mass of brothers—this living pyramid, this human beehive, of which two-thirds were composed of defenceless women and children.
The hurricane of fire fell on this disarmed throng, who only replied by heart-rending cries of agony. The three faces of the altar were covered with the dead and wounded bodies of the unfortunate victims.
From the height of the pyramid where I found myself—between Robert and his wife,—I perceived that the artillery were about to make fire on the people with the cannon, at the risk of firing on the cavaliers and paid guard, when Lafayette perceiving the movement, dug the spurs into his horse, and galloped to the mouth of the cannon, where he placed himself.