struck in Paris, and you will have the explanation of the Revolution of 1848, such as one day it will appear in history, and as I myself intend to write it if God preserves my life. Will you be so good as to present a copy of my speech to Lord Lansdowne, and remember me particularly to him? .

I have alluded only to the past in this letter; to treat of the future more than a letter would be required.

We are in the most extraordinary position that a great nation has ever been thrown into. We are forced to witness great misfortunes; we are surrounded by great dangers. My chief hope is in the lower orders. They are deficient in intelligence, but they have instincts which are worthy of all admiration. I am myself astonished, and a foreigner would be even more surprised, to see how strong a feeling for order and true patriotism prevails: to see their good sense in all things of which they are capable of judging, and in all matters on which they have not been deceived by the ambitious dreamers to whom they were abandoned.

Adieu, dear Senior, &c.

A. DE TOCQUEVILLE.

Paris, April 17, 1848.

They are very valuable to

My dear Mr. Senior,-I received with great pleasure

the papers you sent to me.

me, as indeed everything is which comes from you.

I have not yet been able to call upon Mr. Rogers. In these troubled times one cannot command a moment.

1848.]

Émeute of April 16..

39

During the whole of yesterday I had a musket instead of a pen in my hand. However, the day went off capitally, and would have been decisive if the moderate party had a man of action at its head. The violent party tried to get up an insurrection. The news which reached them from the departments announcing the certain triumph of the moderate party in the elections showed the necessity for striking a blow in Paris.

Yesterday, therefore, an experiment was tried for overturning the Provisional Government. 30,000 or 40,000 workmen assembled in the Champs de Mars. The drum was immediately beaten in Paris.

In half an hour more than 100,000 National Guards were under arms. Battalions were formed in an instant and ran to the Hôtel de Ville crying, 'Long live the Provisional Government!' 'Down with the Communists!' At the end of an hour Paris was in their hands, and the mob, after vainly attempting to enter the Hôtel de Ville, dispersed.

This is the first decisive victory which has been gained by the moderate party for the last two months. God grant that they may understand how to derive from it all the advantages which it may afford!

I am glad to hear that you have resumed your project of visiting us. All who, like you, are interested in witnessing the great dramas presented from time to time by human affairs, should come to Paris. I shall be much obliged if you will bring me some documents which I think will be very useful at this juncture.

1. First, relating to the regulation of the House of

Commons, i.e. all the rules followed by the House in conducting its business.

We probably could learn much from it for the regulation of our Assembly.

2. In the second place, I want some papers containing information as to your income tax.

We shall not be able to avoid a similar tax, and we are anxious to know how it is imposed and collected in your country.

To explain: I wish to know how it is imposed, according to what rules, what is the cost of collection, how much it has lately produced, what effects, economical or others, it has caused, and what are the exemptions?

I shall write no more as I am extremely busy I leave Paris to-day for Normandy for the elections. I shall be back in ten days.

A. DE TOCQUEVILLE.

[A proposal made by M. Wolowski in the Chamber of Deputies to consider the prayer of the Polish delegates asking the assistance of France in restoring the independence of their country, had an effect which had never been anticipated by the distinguished speaker.

It was the pretext for a Red conspiracy. On May 15, a violent attack was made on the Assembly. A body of workmen marched along the Boulevards towards the Place de la Concorde, where they were met by a small detachment of National Guards quite inadequate to resist them. Nor was any opposition offered to their

1848.]

Attack on the Assembly.

4I

progress by a body of 1,000 Gardes Mobiles posted in front of the Assembly. The rioters rushed into the Chamber, imposed the reading of their petition on the members, and carried everything in their own way till a large detachment of National Guards under the command of General Clément Thomas came to the

rescue.

Barbès and the other ringleaders marched to the Hôtel de Ville, where they proclaimed themselves a provisional government. Towards six o'clock Lamartine, accompanied by a strong body of National Guards, penetrated into the Hôtel de Ville, arrested Barbès, Albert, and their colleagues, and consigned them to Vincennes.

These were the events which induced Mr. Senior to write his first journal in May, 1848.—ED.] .

CONVERSATIONS.

Extract from Mr. Senior's Journal.

Friday, May 16.-I drank tea this evening with the Tocquevilles. He attaches more importance to the events of yesterday than was given to them at the Embassy.

The cry, he said, of 'Vive la Pologne!' pronounced by 20,000 voices as they approached the Chamber, 'cette voix colossalle' as he called it, was the most formidable sound that he ever heard. He does not believe that Barbès and his companions had fully concerted their

plan, otherwise their success would have been much greater.

Their entrance into the Assembly they had planned. Courtais, the commander of the National Guard, and Caussidière, the Préfet de Paris, were in the plot. They placed persons in whom they could confide at the entrance in the Rue de Bourgogne, and ordered them to let in the assailants. When they were in, the plan of Barbès was to force the Chamber either to pass his four decrees of war, the contribution of a milliard by the rich, the forbidding the rappel being beaten to summon the National Guards, and the punishment of 'hors la loi' against anyone who should commit violence against the people (that is, resist the mob), or refuse to pass them. For this purpose he wished the mob to retire, and leave the Chamber to obey or refuse.

If they obeyed, they became, as the Convention became after a similar obedience, the slaves of the mob. If they refused, he intended to take down the names of all who refused, declare them 'hors la loi,' and probably have them massacred.

But in the first place, he could not get his followers to quit the Chamber. And in the second place, he could not get them to keep silence for an interval sufficient to enable him formally to put the question on his decrees.

There were among the mob perhaps fifty persons, each of whom wanted to be the hero of the day. So they spent three hours in fighting (literally in fighting), said Tocqueville, for the possession of the tribune, and