Page:Ernest Belfort Bax - A Short History of the Paris Commune (1895).djvu/26

Guards from that position under cover of a peaceful demonstration. Spying two sentries of the National Guard, they made for them and nearly murdered them. Seeing this, about 200 Guards promptly took up their position at the top of the Rue de la Paix. They were greeted with savage cries, and sword-sticks were levelled at them. Bergeret, their leader, repeatedly summoned the rioters to retire, without avail. Finally, seeing the "Nationals" indisposed to use force, the rioters took courage and drew their revolvers, killing two of the Guard and wounding seven others The muskets of the Nationals then went off, leaving a dozen dead, and a large number of revolvers, swordsticks, and hats in the street. The mob scattered in all directions, yelling. Of course, ever on the alert for a pretext for a howl at the movement, the bourgeois press everywhere made immense capital out of this incident. Punch's celebrated special constable—who says to the Chartist, "If I kill you, mind it's nothing; but if you kill me, by George! its murder"—wasn't in it with the journalists on "respectable" middle-class newspapers on this occasion.