Page:The Paris Commune - Karl Marx - ed. Lucien Sanial (1902).djvu/55

negotiations with the Commune respecting the latter's offer to exchange the Archbishop of Paris and a number of other priests retained in Paris as hostages, against Blanqui alone, who had been twice elected to the Commune, but who remained a prisoner at Clairvaux. It showed itself still more clearly in the altered language of Thiers; hitherto hesitating and ambiguous, he now suddenly became insulting, threatening, and brutal. On the south side the Versaillese took, on the 3d of May, the redoubt of Moulin Saquet; on the 9th, the fort of Issy reduced to a heap of ruins by the cannonade; on the 14th, that of Vanves. On the west side they gradually advanced, seizing the numerous buildings and villages which extended to the outer line of fortifications, up to the enceinte itself; on the 21st, they succeeded, owing to treachery and the carelessness of the National Guard posted at that point, in entering the city. The Prussians, who occupied the northern and eastern forts, allowed the Versaillese to press forward into the territory in the north of the city, which the conditions of peace had closed to them, and thence to inaugurate a formidable attack over a long line, which the Parisians, believing them to be covered by the terms of the truce, had in consequence only weakly occupied. The result of this was that the resistance in the western parts of Paris, the wealthier parts of the city, was only feeble; it became tougher and more severe as the attacking troops approached the eastern half, the working class parts of the city. Only after an eight days' struggle did the last defenders of the Commune succumb on the heights of Belleville and Menilmontant. And now the murder of defenseless men, women, and children, which had raged the whole week through in ever-increasing proportions, reached its highest point! The breechloader no longer killed fast enough;