tream was surging against the door of
the office in which they had taken refuge. The people were calling,
ordering, them to go to the meeting-hall of the Municipal Council.

There they were greeted by this clamour: "The Republic! Long live
the Republic! Proclaim the Republic!" Lamartine, who was at first
interrupted by the cries, succeeded at length with his grand voice in
calming this feverish impatience.

The members of the Provisional Government were thus enabled to return
and resume their session and lively discussion. The more ardent ones
wanted the document to read: "The Provisional Government proclaims the
Republic." The moderates proposed: "The Provisional Government desires
the Republic." A compromise was reached on the proposition of M.
Cremieux, and the sentence was made to read: "The Provisional Government
'is for' the Republic." To this was added: "subject to the ratification
of the people, who will be immediately consulted."

The news was at once announced to the crowds in the meeting-hall and in
the square outside, who would listen to nothing but the word "republic,"
and saluted it with tremendous cheering.

The Republic was established. _Alea jacta_, as Lamartine observed later.

THE TWENTY-FIFTH.

During the morning everything at and in the neighbourhood of the Mairie
of the Eighth Arrondissement was relatively calm, and the steps to
maintain order taken the previous day with the approval of M. Ernest
Moreau appeared to have assured the security of the quarter.* I thought
I might leave the Place Royale and repair towards the centre of the city
with my son Victor. The restlessness and agitation of a people (of the
people of Paris!) on the morrow of a revolution was a spectacle that had
an irresistible attraction for me.

* On the evening of the 24th, there had been reason to apprehend
disturbances in the Eighth Arrondissement, disturbances particularly
serious in that they would not have been of a political character. The
prowlers and evil-doers with hang-dog mien who seem to issue from the
earth in times of trouble were very much in evidence in the streets.
At the Prison of La Force, in the Rue Saint Antoine, the common law
criminals had begun a revolt by locking up their keepers. To what public
force could appeal be made? The Municipal Guard had been disbanded, the
army was confined to barracks; as to the police, no one would have
known where to find them. Victor Hugo, in a speech whic