Page:The Rise and Fall on the Paris Commune in 1871.djvu/265

 fort, and the rest were made prisoners. The troops did not attempt to occupy the place, believing it to be mined, and in the evening two battalions of insurgents arrived, and again took possession. The place, however, remained quite at their mercy, as it was so far isolated that the only communication open was by a trench between the fort and Petit-Vanves. The village of Vanves itself was entirely occupied by the soldiers, and their outposts were in the first houses of Malakoff at less than musket-shot distance from the ramparts. The progress of the army at Issy was also very apparent, as the insurgents held only the Parc-des-Oiseaux, the barricades at the head of the convent, and the asylum of Petit-Ménages. The insurgent government, however, sent its best troops in that direction, as it expected that the assault would be made there at the same time as at the Point du Jour. Its Zouaves and Turcos, and most devoted battalions, were being concentrated in the houses between the gate of Vaugirard and the outposts. The Fort of Montrouge was completely silent during the day, and the only battery that supported Vanves was bastion No. 73.

The greatest confusion seemed at present to prevail in the intercourse between the Commune and the Central Committee. The conflict which had arisen a short time back between those two powers seemed to have terminated by the triumph of the latter, which was admitted to possess the jurisdiction of the whole National Guard. It was generally thought that the order of the Committee of Public Safety, entrusting to the Central Committee the war administration, had put an end to all competition of authority; but as the co-existence of two such bodies was not only totally irregular, but certain to promote rivalry, a further disagreement was certain to speedily arise.

Accordingly, a new transformation of the War Department, evidently directed against the Central Committee,