chandeliers, and a chimney-piece with fine, antiquated carvings, that give it a venerable appearance. Here Robespierre not only presided at the counsels that sent hundreds to the guillotine, but from this same spot he, with his brother, St. Just and others, were dragged before the Committee of Public Safety, and thence to the guillotine, and justice and revenge satisfied.
The window from which Lafayette addressed the people in 1830, and presented to them Louis Philippe as the king, was shown to us. Here the poet, statesman, philosopher and orator, Lamartine, stood in February, 1848, and, by the power of his eloquence, succeeded in keeping the people quiet. Here he forced the mob, braved the bayonets presented to his breast, and, by his good reasoning, induced them to retain the tri-colored flag, instead of adopting the red flag, which he considered the emblem of blood.
Lamartine is a great heroic genius, dear to liberty and to France; and successive generations, as they look back upon the revolution of 1848, will recall to memory the many dangers which nothing but his dauntless courage warded off. The difficulties which his wisdom surmounted, and the good service that he rendered to France, can never be adequately estimated, or too highly appreciated. It was at the Hotel de Ville that the republic of 1848 was proclaimed to the people.
I next paid my respects to the Column of July, that stands on the spot formerly occupied by the Bastile. It is one hundred and sixty-three feet in height, and on the
