and did their duty.

The official report said: "Some of our soldiers took to flight
with regrettable haste,"--a phrase which became a great joke among
the Parisians.

That night the Reds breathed fire and fury against the Government,
"and the respectable part of Paris," says M. de Sarcey, the great
dramatic critic, "saw themselves between two dangers. It would
be hard to say which of them they dreaded most. They hated the
Prussians very much, but they feared the men of Belleville more."

Meantime Jules Favre, who had been appointed Minister for Foreign
Affairs, had procured a safe-conduct from the Prussians, and had
gone out to see Count Bismarck and King William, who had their
headquarters at Baron Rothschild's beautiful country seat of Ferrières.
His object was to obtain an armistice, that a National Assembly
might be convoked which would consider the terms of peace with
the Prussians.

The Chancellor of North Germany declared that he did not recognize
the Committee of Defence, represented by Julus Favre, as a legitimate
government of France competent to offer or to consider terms of
peace. He treated M. Favre with the greatest haughtiness, utterly
refusing any armistice, but at the close of their first interview
he consented to see him again the next day.

"I was," says Jules Favre, "at the Château de Ferrières by eleven
A. M., but Count Bismarck did not leave the king's apartments before
twelve. I then gathered from him the conditions that he demanded