Page:The Rise and Fall on the Paris Commune in 1871.djvu/462

 "I should like," said the child, drawing a watch from his pocket, "to carry this to the concierge who lives opposite; he would know to whom to give it."

The captain, who, even in the fever caused by powder, sees but a child in the insurgent, divines the artless subterfuge of the poor fellow.

"Well, go! and hurry yourself!" he said, roughly.

The platoon of execution understood also, when, suddenly, running as though for an urgent affair, the child re-appeared, placed himself before the soldiers, with his back to the wall, and said, "Me voilà!"

The captain looked at his men, and the men at their captain; everybody was confounded.

But the captain had his own idea; he advanced furiously to the child, and, taking him by the shoulders, gave him a violent kick, saying, "Get out of the way, you wretched little imp."

Meanwhile the Generals Vinoy and Douay gained possession, after a shorter but no less violent attack than that of the Chateau-d'Eau, of the Place de la Bastille. Here the houses suffered, as everywhere else in Paris, as much from the flames spread by petroleum as from artillery projectiles. Immense buildings recently constructed at the head of the Rue Saint-Antoine were entirely consumed.

The troops next precipitated themselves into the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, through which the principal retreat of the Federals had been managed, and occupied it in a few hours, notwithstanding the formidable defences with which the Faubourg was covered as far as the Place du Trône. The laboring population of this former birthplace of all revolutionary agitations, had associated but feebly in the resistance, which was due almost exclusively to Federals from other quarters who had taken refuge in the old faubourg.