Page:The invasion of the Crimea vol. 1.djvu/311

BETWEEN THE CZAR AND THE SULTAN. 2G9 their personal energy than by the aid of the CHAP. people, these men threw up a slight barricade at L_ the corner of the Rue St Marguerite. Against ^^oalie this there marched a battalion of the 19th Regi- *£&""■ ment ; and then there occurred a scene which may make one smile for a moment, and may then al- most force one to admire the touching pedantry of brave men, who imagined that, without policy or warlike means, they could be strong with the mere strength of the law. Laying aside their fire- arms, and throwing across their shoulders scarfs which marked them as Representatives of the People, the Deputies ranged themselves in front of the barricade, and one of them, Charles Baudin, held ready in his hand the book of the Constitu- tion. When the head of the column was within a few yards of the barricade, it was halted. For some moments there was silence. Law and Force had met. On the one side was the Code demo- cratic, which France had declared to be perpetual ; on the other a battalion of the line. Charles Bau- din, pointing to his book, began to show what he held to be the clear duty of the battalion ; but the whole basis of his argument was an assumption that the law ought to be obeyed ; and it seems that the officer in command refused to concede what logicians call the ' major premiss,' for, in- stead of accepting its necessary consequence, he gave an impatient sign. Suddenly the muskets of the front-rank men came down, came up, came level ; and in another instant their fire pelted straight into the group of the scarfed Deputies.