At the moment I arrived the throne of the king was borne away by a jubilant band of revellers; and, after being paraded through the streets, was burned at the Place de la Bastille.
I entered the palace, and passed through the long suites of apartments devoted to occasions of ceremony. A year before I had seen these gorgeous halls filled with the flush and the fair—kings, princes, and nobles—gathered to this focal point of luxury, refinement, and taste from every quarter of the world. How little did Louis Philippe, at that moment, dream of "coming events!" How little did the stately queen—a proud obelisk of silk, and lace, and diamonds—foresee the change that was at hand! I recollected well the effect of this scene upon my own mind, and felt the full force of the contrast which the present moment offered. In the very room where I had seen the pensive and pensile Princess de Joinville and the Duchess de Montpensier—the latter then fresh from the hymeneal altar, her raven hair studded with diamonds like evening stars—whirling in the mazy dance, I now beheld a band of creatures like Calibans, gambolling to the song of the "Marseillaise!"
On every side my eye fell upon scenes of destruction. Passing to the other end of the palace, I beheld a mob in the chambers of the princesses. Some rolled themselves in the downy beds, others anointed their shaggy heads with choice pomatum, exclaiming, "Dieu! how sweet it smells!" One of the gamins, grimed with gunpowder, blood, and dirt, seized a tooth-brush, and placing himself before a mirror, seemed delighted at the manifest improvement which he produced upon his ivory.
On leaving the palace, I saw numbers of the men drinking wine from bottles taken from the well-stocked cellars. None of them were positively drunk. To use the words of "Tam O'Shanter," "They were na fou, but just had plenty"—perhaps a little more. They flourished their guns and pistols, brandished their swords, and performed various antics, but they offered no insult to any one. They seemed in excellent humor, and made more than an ordinary display of French politesse. They complimented the women, of whom there was no lack; and one of them, resembling a figure of Pan, seized a maiden by the waist, and both rigadooned merrily over the floor.
Leaving this scene of wreck, confusion, and uproar, I proceeded toward the gate of the gardens leading into the Rue de Rivoli. I was surprised to find here a couple of ruthless-looking blousemen, armed with pistols, keeping guard. On inquiry, I found that the mob themselves had instituted a sort of government. One fellow, in the midst of the devastation in the palace, seeing a man put something into his pocket, wrote on the wall, "Death to thieves!" The Draconian code was immediately adopted by the people, and became the law of Paris. Five persons, taken in acts of robbery, were shot down by the people, and their bodies exposed in the streets, with the label of "Thief" on their breast. Thus order and law seemed to spring up from the instincts of society, in the midst of uproar and confusion, as crystals are seen shooting from the chaos of the elements.
Three days had now passed, and the revolution was accomplished. The people soon returned to their wonted habits; the Provisional Government proceeded in its duties; the barricades disappeared; and in a single week the more obtrusive traces of the storm that had passed had vanished from the streets and squares of Paris.