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could. If there were no sofas or chairs, some, exhausted in strength,
but not in heart, seated themselves on the floor. All became copyists of
the decrees and proclamations; one dictated, ten wrote. They wrote on
tables, on the corners of furniture, on their knees. Frequently paper
was lacking, pens were wanting. These wretched trifles created obstacles
at the most critical times. At certain moments in the history of peoples
an inkstand where the ink is dried up may prove a public calamity.
Moreover, cordiality prevailed among all, all shades of difference were
effaced. In the secret sittings of the Committee Madier de Montjau, that
firm and generous heart, De Flotte, brave and thoughtful, a fighting
philosopher of the Devolution, Carnot, accurate, cold, tranquil,
immovable, Jules Favre, eloquent, courageous, admirable through his
simplicity and his strength, inexhaustible in resources as in sarcasms,
doubled, by combining them, the diverse powers of their minds.
Michel de Bourges, seated in a corner of the fireplace, or leaning on a
table enveloped in his great coat, his black silk cap on his head, had
an answer for every suggestion, gave back to occurrences blow for blow,
was on his guard for danger, difficulty, opportunity, necessity, for his
is one of those wealthy natures which have always something ready either
in their intellect or in their imagination. Words of advice crossed
without jostling each other. These men entertained no illusion. They
knew that they had entered into a life-and-death struggle. They had no
quarter to expect. They had to do with the Man who had said, "Crush
everything." They knew the bloody words of the self-styled Minister,
Merny. These words the placards of Saint-Arnaud interpreted by decrees,
the Praetorians let loose in the street interpreted them by murder. The
members of the Insurrectionary Committee and the Representatives
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