Trochu. Entering the army in 1840 at twenty-five years of age, he served in Algeria as captain in 1843, in the Crimea as lieutenant-colonel and afterwards general of brigade, and in Italy in 1859 as a general of division. In 1867 he lost the favor of the court by publishing a pamphlet which revealed too freely the condition of the French army, but this did not prevent the emperor from naming him governor of Paris on the 17th of August, 1870, a position which he held till the close of the siege by the choice of the new government, which also made him its president. Of his military capacity this work does not attempt to judge. The energy displayed in preparing the forts and city for a siege, and the fact that he did keep the Prussians at bay for four months and a half, are in his favor; but the fussiness and loquacity which we are apt to think characteristic of French officials told against him, and that he failed to make efficient soldiers out of the material at his command showed that he could not have been a born leader. But what is here insisted on is the perfect sincerity of his unselfish devotion to hist work and his country. Sharing these qualities in some degree with the men both of 1848 and of 1789-1793, the Government of National Defence in the practical application of them shows as great an advance upon the Second Republic as that did upon the First, and entitles us to hope. for everything from the future of popular government in France.

It is worthy of remark that the new government met with no opposition whatever from the Corps Législatif, the Senate, or the ministry, which all disappeared without sign.

The whole fabric of the Empire dissolved at once. All its champions, all its obedient functionaries and servants, yielded at once without one act of fidelity or devotion. Yet it was from no want of courage, still less from calculated defection. It was the instinctive

feeling of the human conscience, awakened by the excess of disaster and manifested in unanimous reprobation of the man and the system which had ruined France. It is this which explains the passiveness of the Legislative Body and the ministry. They accepted their fate, knowing in their hearts that they deserved it. Perhaps some of them were irritated against those of their colleagues who took power, but none regarded these as usurpers, for all knew that they had acted against their will and because the majority had persistently refused to exercise any act of vigor while it was still time.

And this is the answer to all the accusations which have been heaped upon the deputies who on the 4th of September thought it their duty to place themselves at the head of public affairs. What would have happened if they too had bowed their heads before the popular flood, and put their personal safety before that of their country? The Commune of Paris would have been installed at the Hôtel de Ville, and with it civil war, the division of the army, the ruin of the defence, the disgrace of defeat through anarchy, dishonor in the face of Europe. That was the certain future which was reserved for us, and no candid man can deny it.1

Meantime the victorious Prussians were advancing on Paris, and on the 19th of September the investment was complete, and the last electric wire was cut which connected the inhabitants with the outer world. Only the day previous, M. Favre carried out a resolution to make a last desperate effort to avert the impending disasters. Without the knowledge of the people, or of his colleagues except General Trochu, whose permission was necessary to pass the French outposts, he sought the famous interview with the German Chancellor at Ferrières. The wisdom of his action has been challenged by many, but his reasons given appear to be unanswerable. It is only in works of fiction that accounts so circumstantial are usually given, and no fiction can carry with it the intense interest created by fact. The sketch given of Count Bismarck was no doubt written afterward, but that it was based upon impressions received at the time shows the generosity and freedom from egotism of the writer's

1 Favre, op. cit., Vol. I., p. 92.

mind. Already the Prussian terms included the cession of Alsace, if not of Lorraine, but it was the demand for the surrender, as prisoners of war, of the garrison of Strasburg, which still held out, that drove M. Favre to close the interview.

On the 6th of September, M. Favre, as Minister of Foreign Affairs, issued a circular to the French diplomatic agents abroad, in which he declared that "not an inch. of our territory or a stone of our fortresses would be surrendered." This declaration, in view of subsequent events, has been the subject of much ridicule and obloquy; as if it was not the commonest feature of a bargain that each side should put forward the extreme terms which it even desired to obtain. There is no doubt that the phrase expressed the almost unanimous feeling of the country, or that it animated the spirit of resistance which was aroused by the German demand. Again there was much outcry at the folly of the useless resistance of the next five months, involving such vast destruction of life and property, so much of human suffering, and ending in terms even more onerous than were offered in the first interview at Ferrières. Is there an American with blood in his veins who does not honor France for that resistance? Does it become us, so proud of our ancestors who for seven years held out against Great Britain in a struggle quite as hopeless in appearance and with infinitely less cause, to condemn the French because the result was different? Was there not value received in the effect on the spirit of the nation? If France had quietly submitted after the fall of Sedan and Metz, she would have lost caste among the peoples of Europe. It is because she showed herself, even under such conditions, almost a match for the Germans, that she has recovered her place so rapidly.

The wonder is that the resistance was possible. Men enough indeed there were. According to the Constitu

tionnel of September 14 the forces in Paris consisted of

100,000 gardes-mobiles, or militia from the provinces,

170,000 national guards,

9,000 corps francs,

70,000 regular troops,

349,000

and, owing to the energetic measures of General Trochu, not only the troops but the forts seem to have been sufficiently supplied with arms and ammunition. But the forces were not efficiently organized or officered. The difference between trained and volunteer armies has, in this century, greatly increased. To the unmilitary mind it seems strange that the Prussians did not force their way into the city at the start. They probably knew what street fighting on the part of a people like that of Paris in defence of their homes against the foreigner really meant, and haughty as they were they feared a revolt of the public opinion of Europe against such severe measures as would be necessary to reduce the city to subjection. They decided, therefore, to reduce it by famine, trusting that internal dissension would hasten the result.

It was a spectacle without precedent in history, that of a besieged city enclosing in its walls a multitude of nearly two million five hundred thousand souls, a prey to the severest privations, to unspeakable sufferings, and to feverish agitation, and to whom, nevertheless, was left complete liberty of thinking, writing, speaking, and assembling. In the midst of this multitude, four hundred thousand armed citizens, obeying excited chiefs and refusing submission to any regulations except those which suited them, represented the public force, and might in some hours of aberration overthrow and deliver the city which they were charged with defending. Add to this the numberless volunteers, the orators of the clubs and the public square, the journalists who every morning stirred up passion and preached insurrection, spies and conspirators, and it may be imagined what formidable difficulties were presented by the conduct of affairs in the midst of so many causes of disorder. And yet these five months of martyrdom passed over us, and, except on the days of October 31 and January

22, in which the seditions were put down without difficulty, order was not troubled by civil war, and the insurrection so pleasantly predicted and to the concurrence of which the Prussians looked for the success of their designs, did not break out till after the government of defence ceased to exist, when Prussia, though still established at our gates, was bound by a treaty; when disturbances deeply rooted, and which might have been avoided, had thrown into the population of Paris the seeds of death which some rascals developed with infernal skill.1

The behavior of the people cannot but excite admiration. If we consider what a complex problem the daily supply of a great city is, that during those long winter nights a matter of such common necessity as the lighting of the streets was almost wholly suspended; that for weeks at a time there was no communication with the outside world; that a large part of the population consisted of workmen, who though receiving allowance from the government were unemployed and idle, — it seems wonderful that no more disorder took place.

The most trying period was that of the 31st of October. Three events had concurred to excite the population to the highest point, the surrender of Metz, the failure of an attack on the village of Bourget, and the report of negotiations for an armistice undertaken by Thiers. About eleven o'clock on the morning of the 31st some battalions of that part of the National Guard which was given up to sedition had made their way to the Hôtel de Ville, a vast crowd began to assemble, and the members of the government were summoned. Favre says that Picard was earnest in his advice not to go, as it was much wiser to arrange the means of repression from the outside, but being overruled he yielded and went with the others. Étienne Arago, the maire of Paris, then Rochefort, and at last Trochu tried the effect of their eloquence upon the crowd, which kept on increasing every quarter of an hour.

1 Favre, "Simple Récit," etc., Vol. I., p. 100.