[216] At a wineshop of the Place Voltaire we met some quite young soldiers on the Sunday morning. They were marine-fusileers of the 1871 class. Their complexion was sallow, their movements heavy, their eyes dull. "And there are many dead?" said we. "Ah!" answered one of them in a stupefied tone, "we have the order to make no prisoners; it is the general who told us" (they could not tell us the name of their general). "If they had not lighted these fires they would not have been served thus; but as they set on fire, we must kill" (textual). Then he went on talking to his comrade. "This morning there" (and he pointed to the barricade of the Mairie), "one came up in a blouse. We led him off. 'You are not going to shoot me?' said he. 'Oh, I should think not!' We made him pass in front of us, and then, pan, pan; and didn't he kick about funnily!"
[217] Sixty-three officers killed and 430 wounded, 794 soldiers dead and 6024 wounded—in all, 877 dead and 6454 wounded. Rapport du Maréchal MacMahon.
[218] This is the exact number of the hostages executed: four at Ste. Pélagie, six at the Roquette, forty-eight at the Rue Haxo, four at the Petite Roquette, and the banker Jecker.
[219] The Count de Mun said (Enquête sur le 18 Mars, vol. ii. p. 276), "When they were shot, they all died with a kind of insolence which cannot be attributed to a moral sentiment" (the sentiment of the executioner, Monsieur de Mun, no doubt), "and can only be attributed to the resolution to come to an end by death rather than live by working." It is true that MacMahon had said (p. 28), "They seemed to think they were defending a sacred cause, the independence of Paris. In their intentions some of them may have been of good faith." Who is more odious, he who believes he is killing an "insolent," or he who knows that he is killing a martyr?
[220] "On the Seine may be seen a long trail of blood following the course of the water and passing under the second arch from the side of the Tuileries. This trail never stopped."—La Liberté of the 31st May.
[221] Appendix XXXII.
[222] Appendix XXXIII.
[223] This is the figure given by General Appert in the Enquête sur le 18 Mars. MacMahon has said, "When men surrender their arms they must not be shot; that was admitted. Unhappily, on certain points, the instructions I had given were forgotten. I can, however, affirm that the number of executions has been very restricted." Admire the logic of this reasoning. No doubt a list has been kept of all, oblivious as to the victims of the prevotal courts; the "loyal soldier" ignores them completely.
Some days after the battle the Nationale, a Liberal-conservative paper said, "In official circles it is estimated that 20,000 is the number of Federals killed, shot, or dead in consequence of wounds received during the days of May. We should not have dared to give this figure, which seems to us considerable, if we had not got this information from officers who have declared that this estimate is very probably correct."