At last the unhappy inhabitants of Neuilly are able to leave their
cellars. For three weeks, they have been hourly expecting the roofs of
their houses to fall in and crush them; and with much difficulty have
managed during the quieter moments of the day to procure enough to keep
them from dying of starvation. For three weeks they have endured all
the terrors, all the dangers of battle and bombardment. Many are
dead—they all thought themselves sure to die. Horrible details are
told. A little past Gilet’s restaurant, where the omnibus office used
to be, lived an old couple, man and wife. At the beginning of the civil
war, two shells burst, one after another, in their poor lodging,
destroying every article of furniture. Utterly destitute, they took
refuge in the cellar, where after a few hours of horrible suspense, the
old man died. He was seventy, and the fright killed him; his wife was
younger and stronger, and survived. In the rare intervals between the
firing she went out and spoke to her neighbours through the cellar
gratings—“My husband is dead. He must be buried; what am I to
do?”—Carrying him to the cemetery was of course out of the question; no
one could have been found to render this mournful duty. Besides, the
bearers would probably have met a shell or a bullet on the way, and
then others must have been found to carry them. One day, the old woman
ventured as far as the Porte Maillot, and cried out as loud as she
could, “My husband is dead in a cellar; come and fetch him, and let us
both through the gates!”—The sentinel facetiously (let us hope it was
nothing worse) took aim at her with his rifle, and she fled back to her
cellar. At night, she slept by the side of the corpse, and when the
light of morning filtered into her dreary place of refuge, and lighted
up the body lying there, she sobbed with grief and terror. Her husband
had been dead four days, when putrefaction set in, and she, able to
bear it no longer, rushed out screaming to her neighbours: “You must
bury him, or I will go into the middle of the avenue and await death
there!”—They took pity on her, and came down into her cellar, dug a
hole there and put the corpse in it. During three weeks she continued
there, resting herself on the newly-turned earth. To-day, when they
went to fetch her she fainted with horror; the grave had been dug too
shallow, and one of the legs of the corpse was exposed to gaze.
[Illustration: Female Curiosity at Porte Maillot.
“Prenez Garde, Mam’zelle”]
This morning, the 25th of April, at nine o’clock, a dense crowd moved
up the Champs Elysées: pedestrians of all ages and classes, and
vehicles of every description. The truce obtained by the members of the
_Republican Union of the rights of Paris_ was about to begin, and
relief was to be carried to the sufferers at Neuilly. However, some
precautions were necessary, for neither the shooting nor the cannonade
had ceased yet, and every moment one expected to see some projectile or
other fall among the advancing multitude. In the Avenue de la Grande
Armée a shell had struck a house, and set fire to it. Gradually the
sound of the artillery diminished, and then died away entirely; the
crowd hastened to the ramparts.
[Illustration: Porte Maillot and Chapel of St. Ferdinand.]
The chapel was erected by Louis Philippe in memory of the Duke of
Orleans, killed on the spot, July 18th, 1842.
The Porte Maillot has been entirely destroyed for some time, in spite
of what the Commune has told us to the contrary; the drawbridge is torn
from its place, the ruined walls and bastions have fallen into the
moat. The railway-station is a shapeless mass of blackened bricks,
broken stones, glass, and iron-work; the cutting where the trains used
to pass is half filled up with the ruins. It is impossible to get along
that way. Fancy the hopeless confusion here, arising among this myriad
of anxious beings, these hundreds of carts and waggons, all crowding to
the same spot. Each one presses onwards, pushing his neighbour,
screaming and vociferating; the National Guards try in vain to keep
order. To add to the difficulties there is some form to be gone through
about passes. I manage to hang on to a cart which is just going over
the bridge; after a thousand stoppages and a great deal of pushing and
squeezing, I succeeded in getting out, my clothes in rags. A desolate
scene meets my eyes. In front of us, is the open space called the
military zone, a dusty desert, with but one building remaining, the
chapel of Longchamps; it has been converted into an ambulance, and the
white flag with the red cross is waving above it. Truly the wounded
there must be in no little danger from the shells, as it lies directly
in their path. To the left is the Bois de Boulogne, or rather what used
to be the wood, for from where I stand but few trees are visible, the
rest is a barren waste. I hasten on, besides I am hard pressed from
behind. Here we are in Neuilly, at last. The desolation is fearful, the
reality surpassing all I could have imagined. Nearly all the roofs of
the houses are battered in, rafters stick out of the broken windows;
some of the walls, too, have fallen, and those that remain standing are
riddled with blackened holes. It is there that the dreadful shells have
entered, breaking, grinding furniture, pictures, glasses, and even
human beings. We crunch broken glass beneath our feet at every step;
there is not a whole pane in all the windows. Here and there are houses
which the bullets seemed to have delighted to pound to atoms, and from
which dense clouds of red and white dust are wafted towards us. Well,
Parisians, what do you say to that? Do you not think that Citizen
Cluseret, although an American, is an excellent patriot, and “In
consideration of Neuilly being in ruins, and of this happy result being
chiefly due to the glorious resistance organized by the delegate
Citizen Cluseret, decrees: That the destroyer of Neuilly, Citizen
Cluseret, has merited the gratitude of France and the Republic.”
[Illustration: The Inhabitants of Neuilly Entering Paris During The
Armisctice of the 18th of April.]
The firing ceased from nine in the morning until five in the afternoon,
when Paris cabs, furniture-vans, ambulance-waggons, band-barrows, and
all sorts of vehicles were requisitioned to bring in the sad remains
and dilapidated household goods of the suburban bombardés. They entered
by the gate of Ternes—for that of Porte Maillot was in ruins and
impassable. Many went to the Palais de l’Industrie, in the Champs
Elysées, where a commission sat to allot vacant apartments in Paris. On
this occasion some robberies were committed, and refractories escaped:
it is even said that hard-hearted landlords wished to prevent their
lodgers from departing—an object in which the proprietors were not very
successful. The poor woman perched on the top of her relics, saved from
the cellar in which she had lived in terror for fourteen days, deplores
the loss of her husband and the shapeless mass of ruin and rubbish she
once called her happy home; whilst her boys bring in green stuff from
the surburban gardens, and a middle-aged neighbour stalks along with
his pet parrot, the bird all the while amusing himself with elaborate
imitations of the growl of the mitrailleuse and the hissing of shells
ending with terrific and oft-repeated explosions.
Out of all the houses, or rather from what was once the houses, emerge
the inhabitants carrying different articles of furniture, tables,
mattresses, boxes. They come out as it were from their graves.
Relations meet and embrace, after having suffered almost the bitterness
of death. Thousands run backwards and forwards; the carts are heaped up
to overflowing, everything that is not destroyed must be carried away.
A large van filled with orphan children moves on towards the barrier; a
sister of charity is seated beside the driver. The most impatient of
the refugees are already through the Porte Maillot; who will give them
hospitality there? No one seems to think of that. The excitement caused
by all this movement is almost joyous under the brilliant rays of the
sun. But time presses, in a few minutes the short truce will have
expired. Stragglers hurry along with heavy loads. At the gates, the
crowding and confusion are greater than in the morning. Carts heavily
laden, move slowly and with difficulty; the contents of several are
spilled on the highway. More shouting, crowding, and pushing, until the
gates are passed at last, and the emigrant crowd disperses along the
different streets and avenues into the heart of Paris. A happy release
from bondage, but what a dismal promised land!
Then the cannonading and musketry on either side recommences. Destroy,
kill, this horrible quarrel can only end with the annihilation of one
of the two parties engaged. Go on killing each other if you will have
it so, combatants, fellow-countrymen. Some wretched women and children
will at least sleep in safety to-night, in spite of you!
[Illustration: _Federal Officer_. Pardon, Monsieur, but we cannot allow
civilians to remain here.
_Monsieur_. I wait for Valérien to open upon us.]
Yes, my good friends and idlers, the sad scene would not have been
complete without your presence to relieve its sadness. If respect for
your persons kept you away from danger, it at least gives zest to the
place, a locality that in a few short minutes will be dangerous again.
At five the armistice was over, but for all that, the National Guard
had great difficulty in clearing the ground, until real danger, the
excitement sought for, arrived, and sent the spectators much further up
the Avenue de la Grande Armée.
[Illustration: Mdlle, et Ses Cousines.]
5.30. Great Guns of Valérien, Why do you not begin? Know you that tubes
charged with bright eyes are directed against you?