Query: Tricolour flag or red flag?
September 4.—The deposition of the Emperor is proclaimed in Paris.
At 1 o’clock a meeting of exiles is held at my house.
At 3 o’clock I receive a telegram from Paris couched in the following terms: “Bring the children with you.” Which means “Come.”
MM. Claretie and Proust dined with us.
During the dinner a telegram signed “François Hugo” arrived, announcing that a provisional government had been formed: Jules Favre, Gambetta, Thiers.
September 5.—At 6 o’clock in the morning a telegram signed “Barbieux,” and asking the hour of my arrival in Paris, is brought to me. I instruct Charles to answer that I shall arrive at 9 o’clock at night. We shall take the children with us. We shall leave by the 2.35 o’clock train.
The Provisional Government (according to the newspapers) is made up of all the Deputies of Paris, with the exception of Thiers.
At noon, as I was about to leave Brussels for Paris, a young man, a Frenchman, accosted me in the Place de la Monnaie and said:
Monsieur, they tell me that you are Victor Hugo.”