visibly disconcerted my interlocutors. The epithets, canaille, crapule, and assassin, became more and more rare, and their revolvers, at first so actively and impertinently exercised, were returned by degrees to their cases.
Another incident that might have been fatal to me served still more to disconcert them. During the last half of the reign of the Commune, the affair of the bodies found at St. Laurent, Notre Dame des Victoires, and Notre Dame de Lorette had an unfortunate effect. Disregarding the reports of the physicians and what was clearly evident, the revolutionist papers, the Journal Officiel, and the clubs exclaimed at the scandal. The most abominable crimes were imputed to the clergy, against whom a diabolical persecution was excited by extravagant accounts and vile pictures. In vain were these extravagances met by decisive reasons: the reasons themselves became new subjects of crimination and invectives which gave me great concern.
The vaults of the Madeleine were at this epoch filled with bodies. During the siege of Paris by the Prussians, the bodies of several generals and foreigners of distinction had been deposited there till they could be carried to their distant family tombs. I had for several days dwelt on the explanation I could give respecting these bodies so as to silence these furious madmen, but had found none. The time had come when I needed it.
“It is in this miserable parish of the Madeleine,” exclaimed the delegate of the Commune with a smile of contempt and hatred, “that we shall discover the infamy of the priests. I will bet,” continued he, turning toward his agent, “that we shall find here more horrible things than at St. Laurent and Notre Dame
des Victoires. Citizens, let us go down into the vaults!”
The ray of light that I had sought for in vain the three previous weeks all at once beamed into my mind, I found the reason I needed. Though in the power of the dangerous agents of the committee of public safety, I blessed God for his protection.
“I have two observations to make to you,” I replied. “The first is that you will find in the vaults of the Madeleine many more corpses than in the other churches....”
I can still see the delegate laughing with fiendish satisfaction at these words till he nearly fell backwards. “I told you, citizens, that there was more infamy in this church than anywhere else!”
“The second observation, sir, concerns you personally, and from a motive of charity I think it a duty to draw your attention to it. I warn you that several of these bodies belong to illustrious families in Spain, Italy, England, and America, and, if you are rash enough to disturb them, it is with these foreign powers, and not with me, you will have to deal.”
In his place I should have endeavored to dissimulate my embarrassment by doubting this assertion, and requesting to be assured of the fact. But he was not constrained in the least. He waved his hand with a triumphant air, and, as if it were I who proposed to violate the tombs, he exclaimed in the most sonorous manner: “Yes, yes, the Commune will protect these bodies; they shall be protected!”