The matadors of reaction, reanimated by Jules Favre's speech, took this warning for an idle boast. On the 22nd at mid-day they assembled at the Place du Nouvel Opera. At one o'clock they numbered a thousand dandies, squireens, journalists, notorious familiars of the Empire, who marched down the Rue de la Paix to the cry of "Vive l'ordre!" Their plan was, under the cloak of a pacific demonstration, to force the Place Vendôme and to expel the Federals from it; then, masters of the mairie of the first arrondissement, of half of the second and of Passy, they would have cut Paris in two and menaced the Hôtel-de-Ville. Admiral Saisset followed them.
Before the Rue Neuve St. Augustin these pacific demonstration-men disarmed and ill-treated two detached sentries of the National Guard. Seeing this, the Federals of the Place Vendôme seized their muskets and hurried in marching order to the top of the Rue Neuve des Petits-Champs. They were but 200, the whole garrison of the place; the two cannon levelled at the Rue de la Paix had no cartridges. The reactionists soon encountered the first line with the cry, "Down with the Committee! Down with the assassins!" waving a banner and their handkerchiefs, while some of them stretched out their hands to seize the muskets. Bergeret, Maljournal, members of the Committee, in the first ranks, summoned the rioters to retire. Furious cries of "Cowards! brigands!" drowned their voices, and sword-canes were pointed at them. Bergeret made a sign to the drummers. A dozen times the sommations were made and repeated. For several minutes only the roll of the drums was heard, and between these savage cries. The ranks in the rear of the manifestation pushed on those in front and tried to break through the lines of the Federals. At last, despairing no doubt of succeeding by mere bravado, the insurgents fired their revolvers;[96] two guards were killed and seven wounded;[97] Maljournal was struck in the thigh.
The muskets of the guards went off, so to say, spontaneously. A volley and a terrible cry, followed by silence more dismal. In a few seconds the crowded Rue de la Paix was emptied. In the deserted road, strewn with revolvers, sword-canes, and hats, lay about a dozen corpses. If the Federals had only aimed at foes' hearts, there would have been 200 killed, for in this compact mass no shot would have missed. The insurgents had killed one of their own, the Vicomte de Molinat, fallen in the front ranks, his face towards the place, a ball in the occiput. On his body was found a poniard fixed by a small chain. A witty ball struck in the rear the chief editor of the Paris Journal, the Bonapartist De Pène, one of the basest revilers of the movement.
The runaways traversed Paris shouting, "Murder!" The shops of the boulevards were closed and the Place de la Bourse filled with rabid groups. At four o'clock some of the reactionist companies appeared, resolute, in good order, their muskets on their shoulders, and took possession of the quarters of the Bourse.
At three o'clock the event became known at Versailles. The Assembly had just rejected Louis Blanc's bill on the municipal council, and Picard was reading another one refusing all justice to Paris, when the news arrived. The Assembly precipitately raised the sitting; the Ministers looked dumbfoundered.
All their swaggering of the evening before had only been meant to frighten Paris, to encourage the men of order, and provoke a coup-de-main. The incident had occurred, but the Central Committee triumphed. For the first time M. Thiers began to believe that this Committee, able to repress a riot, might after all be a Government.
The news in the evening was more reassuring. The fusillade seemed to have roused the men of order. They were flocking to the Place de la Bourse. A great many officers just returned from Germany came to offer their help. The reactionary companies were establishing themselves solidly in the mairie of the ninth arrondissement and reoccupying that of the sixth, dislodging the Federals of the station of St. Lazare, guarding all the approaches of the occupied quarters, and forcibly arresting the passers-by. They formed a town within the town. The mayors were constituting a permanent committee in the mairie of the second arrondissement. Their resistance was now provided with an army.
FOOTNOTES:
[96] The aggression was so evident, that not one of the twenty court-martials that searched into every detail of the revolution of the 18th March dared allude to the affair of the Place Vendôme.
[97] Their names were published in the Journal Officiel.