Since our first
sitting, a vague and widespread agitation had never ceased to reign in the
town. The mob met every day in the streets and squares; it spread aimlessly,
like the swell of the waves. The approaches to the Assembly were always filled
with a gathering of these redoubtable idlers. A demagogic party has so
many heads, chance always plays so great, and reason so small, a part in its
actions that it is almost impossible to say, either before or after the event,
what it wants or what it wanted. Nevertheless, my opinion then was, and has
since remained, that the leading demagogues did not aim at destroying the
Assembly, and that, as yet, they only sought to make use of it by mastering it.
The attack directed against it on the 15th of May seemed intended rather to
frighten than to overthrow it; it was at least one of those equivocal
enterprises which so frequently occur in times of popular excitement, in which
the promoters themselves are careful not to trace or define precisely their
plan or their aim, so as to remain free to limit themselves to a peaceful
demonstration or force on a revolution, according to the incidents of the day.
Some attempt of
this kind had been expected for over a week; but the habit of living in a
continual state of alarm ends in rendering both individuals and assemblies
incapable of discerning, amid the signs announcing the approach of danger, that
which immediately precedes it. We only knew that there was a question of a
great popular demonstration in favour of Poland, and we were but vaguely disturbed at it. Doubtless the members of the
Government were better informed and more alarmed than we, but they kept their
own counsel, and I was not sufficiently in touch with them to penetrate into
their secret thoughts.
Thus it happened
that, on the 15th of May, I reached the Assembly without foreseeing what was
going to happen. The sitting began as any other sitting might have begun; and
what was very strange, twenty thousand men already surrounded the chamber,
without a single sound from the outside having announced their presence.
Wolowski was in the tribune: he was mumbling between his teeth I know not what
commonplaces about Poland, when the mob at last betrayed its approach with a
terrible shout, which penetrated from every side through the upper windows,
left open because of the heat, and fell upon us as though from the sky. Never
had I imagined that a number of human voices could together produce so immense
a volume of sound, and the sight of the crowd itself, when it surged into the
Assembly, did not seem to me so formidable as that first roar which it had
uttered before showing itself. Many members, yielding to a first impulse of
curiosity or fear, sprang to their feet; others shouted violently, “Keep your
seats!” Everyone sat down again firmly on his bench, and kept silence. Wolowski
resumed his speech, and continued it for some time. It must have been the first
time in his life that he was listened to in silence; and even now it was not he
to whom we listened, but the crowd outside, whose murmurs grew momentarily
louder and nearer.
Suddenly Degousée,
one of our questors, solemnly mounted the steps of the tribune, silently
pushed Wolowski aside, and said, “Contrary to the wishes of the questors,
General Courtais has ordered the Gardes Mobiles guarding the doors of the
Assembly to sheathe their bayonets.”
After uttering
these few words he stopped. This Degousée, who was a very good man, had the
most hang-dog look and the hollowest voice imaginable. The news, the man and
the voice combined to create a curious impression. The Assembly was roused, but
immediately grew calm again; it was too late to do anything: the chamber was
forced.
Lamartine, who had
gone out at the first noise, returned to the door with a disconcerted air; he
crossed the central gangway and regained his seat with great strides, as though
pursued by some enemy invisible to us. Almost immediately, there appeared
behind him a number of men of the people, who stopped still on the threshold,
surprised at the sight of this immense seated assembly. At the same moment, as
on the 24th of February, the galleries were noisily opened and invaded by a flood of people, who
filled and more than filled them. Pressed forward by the mob who followed and
pushed them without seeing them, the first comers climbed over the balustrades
of the galleries, trusting to find room in the Chamber itself, the floor of
which was not more than ten feet beneath them, hung down along the walls, and
dropped the distance of four or five feet into the Chamber. The fall of each of
these bodies striking the floor in succession produced a dull concussion
which at first, amid the tumult, I took for the distant sound of cannon. While
one part of the mob was thus falling into the house, the other, composed principally
of the club-leaders, entered by every door. They carried various emblems of the
Terror, and waved flags of which some were surmounted by a red cap.
In an instant the
mob had filled the large empty space in the centre of the Assembly; and finding
itself pressed for room, it climbed all the little gangways leading to our
benches, and crowded more and more into these narrow spaces without ceasing its
agitation. Amid this tumultuous and incessant commotion, the dust became very
thick and the heat so oppressive that perhaps I would have gone out to breathe
some fresh air, had it been merely a question of the public interest. But
honour kept us glued to our seats.
Some of the
intruders were openly armed, others showed glimpses of concealed weapons, but
none seemed to entertain a fixed intention of striking us. Their expression was
one of astonishment and ill-will rather than enmity; with many of them a sort
of vulgar curiosity in course of gratifying itself seemed to dominate every
other sentiment; for even in our most sanguinary insurrections there are always
a number of people half scoundrels, half sightseers, who fancy themselves at
the play. Moreover, there was no common leader whom they seemed to obey; it was
a mob of men, not a troop. I saw some drunken men among them, but the
majority seemed to be the prey of a feverish excitement imparted to them by the
enthusiasm and shouting without and the stifling heat, the close packing and
general discomfort within. They dripped with sweat, although the nature and
condition of their clothing was not calculated to make the heat very
uncomfortable for them, for several were quite bare-breasted. There rose from
this multitude a confused noise from the midst of which one sometimes heard
very threatening observations. I caught sight of men who shook their fists at
us and called us their agents. This expression was often repeated; for several
days the ultra-democratic newspapers had done nothing but call the
representatives the agents of the people, and these blackguards had taken
kindly to the idea. A moment after, I had an opportunity of observing with what
vivacity and clearness the popular mind receives and reflects images. I heard a
man in a blouse, standing next to me, say to his fellow, “See that vulture down
there? I should like to twist its neck.” I followed the movement of his arm and
his eyes and saw without difficulty that he was speaking of Lacordaire, who was
sitting in his Dominican’s frock on the top bench of the Left. The sentiment
struck me as very unhandsome, but the comparison was admirable; the priest’s
long, bony neck issuing from its white cowl, his bald head surrounded only with
a tuft of black hair, his narrow face, his hooked nose and his fixed,
glittering eyes really gave him a striking resemblance to the bird of prey in
question.
During all this
disorder in its midst, the Assembly sat passive and motionless on its benches,
neither resisting nor giving way, silent and firm. A few members of the
Mountain fraternized with the mob, but stealthily and in whispers. Raspail had
taken possession of the tribune and was preparing to read the petition of the
clubs; a young deputy, d’Adelsward, rose and exclaimed, “By what right does
Citizen Raspail claim to speak here?” A furious howling arose; some men of the
people made a rush at d’Adelsward, but were stopped and held back. With great
difficulty, Raspail obtained a moment’s silence from his friends, and read the
petition, or rather the orders, of the clubs, which enjoined us to pronounce
forthwith in favour of Poland.
“No delay, we’re
waiting for the answer!” was shouted on every side. The Assembly continued to
give no sign of life; the mob, in its disorder and impatience, made a horrible
noise, which by itself alone saved us from making a reply. Buchez, the President,
whom some would make out to be a rascal and others a saint, but who
undoubtedly, on that day, was a great blockhead, rang his bell with all his
might to obtain silence, as though the silence of that multitude was not, under
the present circumstances, more to be dreaded than its cries.
It was then that I
saw appear, in his turn, in the tribune a man whom I have never seen since, but
the recollection of whom has always filled me with horror and disgust. He had
wan, emaciated cheeks, white lips, a sickly, wicked and repulsive expression, a
dirty pallor, the appearance of a mouldy corpse; he wore no visible linen; an
old black frock-coat tightly covered his lean, withered limbs; he seemed to
have passed his life in a sewer, and to have just left it. I was told it was
Blanqui.
Blanqui said one
word about Poland; then, turning sharply to domestic affairs, he asked for
revenge for what he called the massacres of Rouen, recalled with threats the
wretchedness in which the people had been left, and complained of the wrongs
done to the latter by the Assembly. After thus exciting his hearers, he
returned to Poland and, like Raspail, demanded an immediate vote.
The Assembly
continued to sit motionless, the people to move about and utter a thousand
contradictory exclamations, the President to ring his bell. Ledru-Rollin tried
to persuade the mob to withdraw, but nobody was now able to exercise any
influence over it. Ledru-Rollin, almost hooted, left the tribune.
The tumult was
renewed, increased, multiplied itself as it were, for the mob was no longer
sufficiently master of itself to be able even to understand the necessity
for a moment’s self-restraint in order to attain the object of its passion. A
long interval passed; at last Barbès darted up and climbed, or rather leapt,
into the tribune. He was one of those men in whom the demagogue, the madman and
the knight-errant are so closely intermingled that it is not possible to say
where one ends or the other commences, and who can only make their way in a
society as sick and troubled as ours. I am inclined to believe that it was the
madman that predominated in him, and his madness became raging when he heard
the voice of the people. His soul boiled as naturally amid popular passion as
water does on the fire. Since our invasion by the mob, I had not taken my eyes
from him; I considered him by far the most formidable of our adversaries,
because he was the most insane, the most disinterested, and the most resolute
of them all. I had seen him mount the platform on which the President sat, and
stand for a long time motionless, only turning his agitated gaze about the
Assembly; I had observed and pointed out to my neighbours the distortion of his
features, his livid pallor, the convulsive excitement which caused him each moment
to twist his moustache between his fingers; he stood there as the image of
irresolution, leaning already towards an extreme side. This time, Barbès had
made up his mind; he proposed in some way to sum up the passions of the people,
and to make sure of victory by stating its object in terms of precision:
“I demand,” said
he, in panting, jerking tones, “that, immediately and before rising, the
Assembly shall vote the departure of an army for Poland, a tax of a milliard
upon the rich, the removal of the troops from Paris, and shall forbid the
beating to arms; if not, the representatives to be declared traitors to the
country.”
The
Recollections of Alexis de Tocqueville
(1850-1851)
