. We
were anxious, however, to reach the _rendezvous_ at Bonvalet's.

Suddenly some one touched me on the arm. It was Leopold Duras, of the
_National_.

"Go no further," he whispered, "the Restaurant Bonvalet is surrounded.
Michel de Bourges has attempted to harangue the People, but the soldiers
came up. He barely succeeded in making his escape. Numerous
Representatives who came to the meeting have been arrested. Retrace your
steps. We are returning to the old _rendezvous_ in the Rue Blanche. I
have been looking for you to tell you this."

A cab was passing; Charamaule hailed the driver. We jumped in, followed
by the crowd, shouting, "Vive la Republique! Vive Victor Hugo!"

It appears that just at that moment a squadron of _sergents de ville_
arrived on the Boulevard to arrest me. The coachman drove off at full
speed. A quarter of an hour afterwards we reached the Rue Blanche.

CHAPTER VIII.

"VIOLATION OF THE CHAMBER"

At seven o'clock in the morning the Pont de la Concorde was still free.
The large grated gate of the Palace of the Assembly was closed; through
the bars might be seen the flight of steps, that flight of steps whence
the Republic had been proclaimed on the 4th May, 1848, covered with
soldiers; and their piled arms might be distinguished upon the platform
behind those high columns, which, during the time of the Constituent
Assembly, after the 15th of May and the 23d June, masked small mountain
mortars, loaded and pointed.

A porter with a red collar, wearing the livery of the Assembly, stood by
the little door of the grated gate. From time to time Representatives
arrived. The porter said, "Gentlemen, are you Representatives?" and
opened the door. Sometimes he asked their names.

M. Dupin's quarters could be entered without hindrance. In the great
gallery, in the dining-room, in the _salon d'honneur_ of the Presidency,
liveried attendants silently opened the doors as usual.

Before daylight, immediately after the arrest of the Questors MM. Baze
and Leflo, M. de Panat, the only Questor who remained free, having been
spared or disdained as a Legitimist, awoke M. Dupin and begged him to
summon immediately the Representatives from their own homes. M. Dupin
returned this unprecedented answer, "I do not see any urgency."

Almost at the same time as M. Panat, the Representative Jerome Bonaparte
had hastened thither. He had summoned M. Dupin to place himself at the
head of the Assembly. M. Dupi