he
doctrines of the Socialists, he for one should throw in his lot with the
people, until the Government atoned for their atrocity by showing that
they were prepared to listen to the demands of men who knew what they
wanted, and whom the decrepitude of society forced into pushing their
demands in some way or other.

"Of course, this editor was immediately arrested by the military power;
but his bold words were already in the hands of the public, and produced
a great effect: so great an effect that the Government, after some
vacillation, withdrew the state of siege; though at the same time it
strengthened the military organisation and made it more stringent. Three
of the Committee of Public Safety had been slain in Trafalgar Square: of
the rest the greater part went back to their old place of meeting, and
there awaited the event calmly. They were arrested there on the Monday
morning, and would have been shot at once by the general, who was a mere
military machine, if the Government had not shrunk before the
responsibility of killing men without any trial. There was at first a
talk of trying them by a special commission of judges, as it was
called--_i.e._, before a set of men bound to find them guilty, and whose
business it was to do so. But with the Government the cold fit had
succeeded to the hot one; and the prisoners were brought before a jury at
the assizes. There a fresh blow awaited the Government; for in spite of
the judge's charge, which distinctly instructed the jury to find the
prisoners guilty, they were acquitted, and the jury added to their
verdict a presentment, in which they condemned the action of the
soldiery, in the queer phraseology of the day, as 'rash, unfortunate, and
unnecessary.' The Committee of Public Safety renewed its sittings, and
from thenceforth was a popular rallying-point in opposition to the
Parliament. The Government now gave way on all sides, and made a show of
yielding to the demands of the people, though there was a widespread plot
for effecting a coup d'etat set on foot between the leaders of the two so-
called opposing parties in the parliamentary faction fight. The well-
meaning part of the public was overjoyed, and thought that all danger of
a civil war was over. The victory of the people was celebrated by huge
meetings held in the parks and elsewhere, in memory of the victims of the
great massacre.

"But the measures passed for the relief of the workers, though to the