Page:The invasion of the Crimea vol. 1.djvu/338

 29G ORIGIN OF THE WAR OF 1853 they examined the hands of the prisoners whom he had before him, adjudged that the fingers of many of them were black, and at once carried off all those whom they so condemned, with a view (us the 'Judge-Substitute' understood) to shoot them, or have them shot. That they were so shot the ' Judge-Substitute ' was certain, but it is plain that he hud no personal knowledge of what was done to the prisoners after they were carried off by the soldiers. Again, during the night of the 4th and the night of the 5th, people listening in one of the undisturbed quarters of Paris would suddenly hear the volley of a single platoon — a sound not heard, they say, at such hours either before or since. The sound of this occasional platoon-firing was heard coming chiefly, it seems, from the Champ de Mars, but also from other spots, and, in particular, from the gardens of the Luxembourg, and from the esplanade of the Inva- lides. People listening within hearing of this last spot declared, they say, that the sound of the platoon -fire was followed by shrieks and moans; and that once, in the midst of the other cries, they caught some piteous words, close fol- lowed by a scream, and sounding as though they were the words of a lad imperfectly shot and dying hard. Partly upon grounds of this sort, but more per- haps by the teaching of universal fame, Paris came to believe — and, rightly or wrongly, Paris still believes— that during the night of the 4th, and again during the night of the 5th, prisoners