the longest line of kings. Those who had served in
the regular army took charge of as many prisoners as
they could rescue, carried them to their quarters, and
gave them their own beds to sleep in. The officers who
had conducted the unreal attack, and received the piteous
surrender, brought the governor to the Hôtel de Ville,
righting their way through a murderous crowd. For it
was long believed that Delauney had admitted the people
into the first court, and then had perfidiously shot them
down. In his struggles he hurt a bystander, who chanced
to be a cook. The man, prompted, it seems, less by
animosity than by the pride of professional skill, drew
a knife and cut off his head. Flesselles, the chief of the old municipality, appointed by the Crown, was shot soon after, under suspicion of having encouraged Delauney
to resist.
Dr. Rigby, an Englishman who was at the Palais Royal, has described what he saw. First came an enormous multitude bearing aloft the keys of the conquered citadel, with the inscription, "The Bastille is taken." The joy was indescribable, and strangers shook his hand, saying, "We too are free men, and there will never more be war between our countries." Then came another procession, also shouting and rejoicing; but the bystanders looked on with horror, for the trophies carried by were the heads of murdered men. For the nation had become sovereign, and the soldiers who fired upon it were reckoned rebels and traitors. The foreign envoys were all impressed with the idea that the vengeance wrought was out of all proportion with the immensity of the thing achieved. At nightfall the marshal gave orders to evacuate Paris. Besenval was already in full retreat, and the capital was no longer in the possession of the king of France.
Meanwhile the National Assembly, aware of the strength of popular feeling around them, were calm in the midst of danger. Theirs was a diminished part, while, almost within sight and hearing, history was being unmade and made by a power superior to their own. On the morning of the
