. From my balcony I can no longer hear
the cannon; the sky, however, is even brighter from the conflagration
than it was.

_September 20th._

The firing has recommenced. We can hear it distinctly. General Ambert
has been cashiered. _Figaro_ announces that Villemessant has returned.
We are given a dozen paragraphs about this humbug of humbugs, his
uniform, &c., &c. I do not think that he will be either killed or
wounded. The latest telegram from the outer world announces that "Sir
Campbell"--medecin Anglais--has arrived at Dieppe with despatches to the
Ministers of Foreign Affairs and of Marine.

11 A.M.

Paris very quiet and very despondent. Few soldiers about. The Line is
reviled, the Mobile extolled. From all accounts the latter seem to have
behaved well--a little excited at first, but full of pluck. Let the
siege only last a week and they will be capital soldiers, and then we
shall no longer be called upon, to believe the assertions of military
men, that it takes years of drill and idling in a barrack to make a
soldier.

My own impression always has been that Malet brought back a written
answer from Bismarck offering to see Jules Favre. Can it be that, after
all, the Parisians, at the mere sound of cannon, are going to cave in,
and give up Alsace and Lorraine? If they do, I give them up. If my
friends in Belleville descend into the streets to prevent this ignominy,
I descend with them.

4 P.M.

I got, about an hour ago, some way on the road to Charenton, when I was
turned back, and a couple of soldiers took possession of me, and did not
leave me until I was within the city gate. I could see no traces of any
Prussians or of any fighting. Two English correspondents got as far as
St. Denis this morning. After having been arrested half-a-dozen times
and then released, they were impressed, and obliged to carry stones to
make a barricade. They saw no Prussians. I hear that a general of
artillery was arrested last night by his men. There is a report, also,
that the Government mean to decimate the cowards who ran away yesterday,
_pour encourager les autres_. The guns of the Prussians which they have
posted on the heights they took yesterday it is said will carry as far
as the Arc de Triomphe.

There have been two deputations to the Hotel de Ville to interview the
Government with respect to the armistice. One consisted of about 100
officers of the National Guard, most of them from the Faubourgs of St.
Antoin