Page:The Rise and Fall on the Paris Commune in 1871.djvu/143



sympathy with the object of our mission, and procured for us an interview with M. Thiers. The Chief of the Executive Power, to whom the terms of the powers we had received from the Syndical Chambers had been communicated, replied very categorically to the two points mentioned above. With respect to the maintenance of the Republic, he affirmed to us, 'on his honor,' in the clearest and most positive language, that never, he living and in power, the Republic in France should fall! He reminded us that he had already said the same in the Chamber, and authorized us to repeat it, in his name, to the persons who had sent us and to the public. He added that, notwithstanding the personal tendencies of certain individuals or groups in the Chamber, 500 deputies at least would support him in that order of ideas; and that, in fine, the Republic, if it had reason to mistrust the excesses of factions, had nothing to fear from the disposition of the Chamber. These assurances, which we received with joy, were besides on every point in conformity with the confidence testified on the previous evening by the deputies of the Left. On the second point, that of the municipal liberties of Paris, the Chief of the Executive Power declared to us that the city could not expect anything more from the Government than the application of the common law, as established by the municipal bill which the Chamber was about to vote. On that subject we avoided entering on a discussion which could not lead to any result, for we did not hope to convert to municipalist or federalist ideas the well-known centralism of M. Thiers. We, however, thought right to communicate to him the note drawn up with the deputies of the Left. M. Thiers listened attentively to the reading of the paper; he neither ratified explicitly any of its dispositions, nor formally contested any of them; and the explanations exchanged on various paragraphs, especially on that relative to the