Page:The Rise and Fall on the Paris Commune in 1871.djvu/470



that the army, thanks to the devotedness of its soldiers and the ability of its chiefs, has become completely mistress of Paris."

On the same day, the Minister of Foreign Affairs sent by telegram the following note to the diplomatic representatives of France in foreign countries:

", May 26th.

":—The abominable work of the odious criminals who are now perishing under the heroic efforts of our army, cannot be confounded with a political act. It constitutes a series of crimes, provided for and punished by the laws of every civilized country. Murder, robbery and incendiarism, systematically ordered, and prepared with an infernal skill, cannot permit to the persons engaged in them any other refuge than that of expiation by the law.

"No nation can cover them with immunity, and their presence on the soil of any would be a shame and a peril. If, therefore, you learn that any individual, compromised in the crimes at Paris, has crossed the frontier of the country to which you are accredited, I request you at once to solicit from the local authorities his immediate arrest, and to inform me of what you have done, in order that I may apply for his extradition.

"Receive, etc.,

"

The French Government immediately learned, in answer, that the Belgian Cabinet would not consider as political refugees any of the men concerned in the crimes of Paris, but would deliver them up at once; while the Spanish Consul at Marseilles announced that he would permit all vessels of his country in that port to be searched, and that the authorities of Madrid had decided that all French criminals who crossed the frontier would be seized and given up.