PARIS AFTER THE CAPTURE.

Evening Star, Volume IX, Issue 2634, 27 July 1871, Page 3

PARIS AFTER THE CAPTURE.

A SCENE OF DESOLATION IiRUTALITY OF THE VERSAILLISTS. Paris, May 2t>th.— It would be impossible to describe as it merits the aspect of Paris at the present moment. On all sides there is nothing to he seen hut material and ruin. It is not only the burning of the public edifices •of which, only a few days ago, Paris was so justly proud, that it is to be lamented, but the utter destruction of all confidence, of all 'sentiment of a common origin which has hitherto been a remarkable part of the ParU sian character. So far from earing to r his neighbour, every Parisian now looks with suspicion pn his dearest friends, and is in-

dined to keep aloof from those he loves best. Arrests are made in the streets every hour, ind for the most trifling causes. No one is spared—foreigners least of all —for the Versaillists, among other foolish ideas, have gut it into their heads- that foreigners were the chief promoters of the insurrection. Two \mericans were arrested last night, and Mr Washburne had to bestir himself in order to have them set at liberty. Two officers of the English army were arrested on Wednesday because they had been seen near a barricade, and were only released by the intercessions of an attache of the British Embassy. In fact, everybody is arrested without much respect of either persons or nationalities. Mr Washburne has been very badly received by Marshal MaeMahon’s staff, because he did his duty and remained in Paris to protect the very large amount of i roperty belonging to American citizens, which remained in the city. Besides the American Minister ha Ito look after the Alsatians and Lorrainers and to protect them from the Commune. He infer red me yesterday that he had signed nearly 5,000 passes for the inhabitants of Alsace anil Lorraine, who were anxious to claim the protection of their new nationality. After all the protestations of attachment to Fr.-tne, to which we have been treated la ely, it does seem a little strange that the A slatians, should be in such a hurry to swear allegiance to their enemies. In the streets all is destruction, ravage, and desolation. Lamps and fountains and statutes have been smashed to atoms, and houses have been so damaged by shells that the first gale of wind will bring them crashing to the ground. All the finest palaces and public buildings in Paris are a heap of smoking ruins. On the heights of La Vilette and Belleville the fight still rages and the cannonade still rings in our ears. Troops of tattered, begriinmed prisoners are constantly passing through the streets, accompanied by soldiers with loaded rifles on their shoulders, and they are only too ready to use their chassepots. Yesterday, I saw a troup ef prisoners, with many women among them conducted up the Hue Troniclet, just behind the Madeleine. An unfortunate woman, exhausted by fatigue, dropped half fainting on the ground. “Get up,” said an officer. “ I cannot,” she replied. The officer then drew his revolver and shot her through the heart. Scenes of a similar kind are of daily occurrence. Yesterday, close to my own house, a poor old man, who has been an inhabitant of my quarter for years, was denounced by a woman in the street. He was arrested by a soldier and taken to the Matrie. This morning, L heard • to my horror, that he had been shot. He leaves four children and an English wife. The brutality of the officers is only equalled by their ignorance. A friend of mine, an Englishman, had placed fhe red ensign of Great Britain in his doorway, and the Communists had respected the house as that of a foreigner. A Lieutenant of marines came yesterday to make a search in the house. “ What is that flag ?” he asked of its owner. John Bull got angry, and answered that French sailors ought to know it well, for it had soared above the tri-colour in many a bloody fight, The Louvre and the National Library and the Luxembourg have escaped the flames. But themost frightful disaster is the burning of the Monte de Piete. During the last eight months people by hundreds of thousands have put valuables into that institution for safety. Fancy their desolation at the destruction. One cannot understand what drove the insurgents to so terrible a step, for the working men have even more to lose, if it be possible, by the destruction of the Mont de Piete, than the rich.

THE HORRORS OF VICTORY—DESPERATE ACTS OF THE FEMALE INSURGENTS. I took a walk down the Hue Kivoli, toward the Hotel de Yille, to judge of the amount of damage done, and at the corner of the Hue Castiglionc became aware of the approach of a great crowd of people yelling and shaking their fists. The cortcye was headed by a company of mounted gendarmes, behind whom came two artillerymen dragging between them a soiled bundle of rags, that tottered and struggled and fell down under the blows that were showered upon it by all who were within reach. It was a woman who had been caught in the act of spreading petroleum. Her face was bleeding, and her hair streaming down her back, from which her clothing had been torn. On they dragged her, followed by a booting mob, till they reached the corner of the Louvre, and there they propped her up against a, wall, already half dead from the treatment she had received. The e.rowd ranged itself in a circle, and 1 have never seen a picture more perfect and complete in its details than was presented by that scene. The gasping, shrinking figure in the centre, surrounded by a crowd who could scarce be kept from tearing her in pieces, who waved their arms, crying ‘ ‘ Drown her ! drown her •! * On one side a barricade, stjll strewn with broken guns and hats,—a dead National Guard lying in the fosse, —behind a group of mounted gendarmes, ami then a perspective of ruined streets and blackened houses, culminating in the extreme distance in the still burning Hotel de Villc. Presently two revolvers were discharged, and the bundle of rags fell forward in a pool of blood. The popular thirst for vengeance was satisfied, and so the crowd dispersed in search of further excitement elsewhere.

HOW THE I'ALACES AND PRIVATE RESIDENCES WERE El RED. “ Paris shall not exist, if Paris floes not belong to the Commune.” Such was their hellish resolve, and they proceeded to carry out the throat of destroying Ihc capital which they could not retain. They set to work in three distinct ways. In the palaces and public offices which they commanded they disposed at regular intervals, sometimes bottles, snmet'incs pots of petroleum. When the vessels of petroleum were arranged at proper distances, one of them would be overturned and ignited; the flames would rapidly spread, and the whole building would soon be past salvation. It was iu this way that the Tuileries, the Palais Royal, the Hotel de Yille, the Palace of the Legion of Honor, and other celebrated public edifices were set in flames. This arrangement was all made in the Ministry of Marine, but the wretches engaged in the work of destruction had to fly before they could set fire to the pots of petroleum which they had planted in the most likely corridors. There was a second method adopted for the destruction of private houses. When it became necessary to retire from a particular barricade, the Guards tore to pieces the beds which formed part of the barricades, took the tow out of tbo beds, dipped it in petroleum, and loaded their guns with it. Then they fired the tow into the windows of the houses. It was in this way that the block of houses in the Kuo Koyale, facing the Madeleine, was set on fire.