[8] The White Terror, the massacre in the south of France, the executions without appeal which followed the first restoration of Kings by Divine right, are well known to all. It did not stop there.
On October 27, 1815, Monsieur Pasquler read in the Chamber a report on the projected law on seditious speeches and writings:
"We would pronounce," he declared, "the penalty of hard labor against all seditious slogans, speeches or writings if delivered individually.
"Death, if they are the result of concerted action.
"The same penalty as for parricide if they have any noticeable effect."
Another, Monsieur C——, rose, and in concert with two of his royalist colleagues proposed with great insistence that the penalty of death be made applicable to all who hoisted the tricolored flag.
[9] This portrait of courage is justified by the heroic death of two young girls, about eighteen years old, who, their hair flowing to the winds, their arms bare, held their place on a barricade near St. Denis Street in June, 1848.
[10] More than anyone else, we deplored the sad insurrection of June, 1848, and the blood that flowed both before and behind the barricades; but we are equally revolted by the abominable calumnies with which all the insurrectionists, without distinction, have been pursued. We call to witness brave General Piré, who, in a letter to the Representatives of the people, expresses himself as follows:
"Citizen Representatives, having entered first by force of bayonet behind the barricade on National St. Martin Street on the 23rd of June, I found myself for several minutes alone among insurrectionists animated by unspeakable exasperation. We fought on both sides to the last notch. They could have killed me; they did not do so. I was in the ranks of the National Guard, and an old General. They respected a veteran of Austerlitz and Waterloo. The memory of their generosity will never leave me. I fought them to the point of death. I found them brave, they spared my life. They were defeated—unhappy ones with whom I should have shared my bread, come what might.
"Piré.
"Lieutenant General."