At the entrance of the room a young man seized with frightful convulsions had been laid down on the parquet. He was partly dressed as a soldier of the line, and partly as a national guardsman. He was doubtless one of the too numerous soldiers who had united with the insurgents, and been drawn into serving their sad cause. The fusillade from the ranks of his new colleagues, and the numerous victims they had just shot down, must have caused a violent fit
of remorse. He was not wounded, but only had a sudden nervous attack, that affected him in a manner painful to behold. He did not appear to understand anything, and was suffering from contractions and contorsions of a truly frightful character. I approached him—tried to calm him with some kind words, and then recommended him aloud to the care of the two infirmarians of the International society. The national guards who surrounded him appeared touched to see manifested for one of their number an interest equal to that I had just shown for the victims of devotedness to the cause of law and order.
Before leaving the Place Vendôme I wished to ascertain if any of the victims had been taken to the ambulance of M. Constant Say. This was one of the six ambulances I was appointed to visit during the siege, to administer religious aid and awaken the moral sense of the soldiers who were sick or wounded. This ambulance was kept in perfect order. More than once, in observing the meals of the wounded, I envied them the healthful and abundant nourishment served up to them during the interminable months of December and January. They were treated as real members of the family, and were truly the spoiled children of the house. They were daily visited by one of the most celebrated physicians of Paris, who lavished on them the most intelligent care, and by the minister of Jesus Christ, who no less kindly spoke to them of God, their souls, their absent mothers, and of their temporal and eternal welfare. It could not be otherwise in a family whose extensive industrial establishment and inexhaustible charity are such a benefit to the laboring classes of Paris. I had the consolation of seeing all the soldiers who were taken
to this ambulance leave it better Christians and better Frenchmen.
As to the rest, during the entire siege, the solicitude of the Parisians for the sick and wounded soldiers was truly admirable, and the praise I am bound in justice to accord to the ambulance of M. Constant Say, may be equally given to the rest I was appointed to visit: the ambulances of M. Frottin, formerly mayor of the first arrondissement, in the Rue St. Honoré; that of M. Jourdain, a member of the Institute, in the Rue du Luxembourg; of Dr. Moissenet, a physician of the Hôtel Dieu, in the Rue Richepanse; of Madame Dognin, of the Point-du-Jour at Auteuil; and, finally, the ambulance bravely founded and directed at Grenelle by some laboring women of ardent faith, and a devotedness that works wonders, and transferred after the bombardment of Grenelle to the magnificent hôtel of M. le Comte Mercy d’Argenteau on the Rue de Suresne.
I was also aware that there were still some wounded soldiers in M. Say’s ambulance. The brutal invasion of the Place Vendôme had prevented me from visiting them the two days previous. To go there, I was obliged to cross the entire Place. It seemed more like a field of battle than a Place. Here were stacks of arms, there were caissons full of supplies, further on were delegates of the central committee of the Hôtel de Ville, who where transmitting orders with feverish haste, and everywhere were the insurgents who had just fired, and who were ready to take fresh aim.
I had no longer an armed guard to accompany me. During my walk, which I frankly acknowledge would have seemed much shorter on ordinary occasions, I was again an object of insult and sarcasms not highly seasoned with wit from some, of respect
and sympathy from others, and of astonishment or indifference from the greatest part. I had never seen so great a number of persons eating and drinking. Their appetite only gave out after complete exhaustion of the means of gratifying it. It is true that, to the demoralized workmen who abound in Paris, the word riot signifies the time for good eating, and still better drinking, and no work at all.
Against the railing that surrounds the column were squatting several national guardsmen, to whom a cantinière dealt out liquor. The oldest was certainly not eighteen. At my approach one of them, who had doubtless been a chorister in some church, instinctively made a respectful bow. A second, who made some pretensions to delicate wit, pointed at me with his sabre, uttering a laugh more stupid than malicious. A third, and this became more serious, loaded, or pretended to load, his musket, which he pointed at me. At the same time the cantinière encouraged him with atrocious words, that no delicate ear would pardon me for relating. I had had for seven months so many occasions to recommend my soul to God, that I thought it opportune to do so once more. Nevertheless, not to take things too seriously, I recalled the amusing reply made me by an excellent man, from the neighborhood of St. Sulpice, who was obliged, after the three first days of bombardment on the left side by the Prussians, to seek refuge in the vicinity of the Madeleine. When I approved of his prudent decision, he replied, “In fact, I could not reasonably pass every night in recommending my soul to God!”
I arrived at my ambulance without any harm but a momentary fright. None of the victims of the