Things were at their worst on Wednesday night, but on
Thursday morning the prospect from the point of view of law and order was much ameliorated. The Government struck a blow which gave them command of the situation. Upon hearing that the Prime Minister had decided on their arrest, the chief agitators and leaders of the strike, together with a number of Socialist Deputies, including M. Jaures and M. Valliant, gathered on Wednesday evening in the offices of the Socialist organ, Humaniti,—a symposium which included the staff of the Anarchist and anti-militarist paper, La Guerre &dale. The Times correspondent tells us that they sat up all night in the good old revolutionary style, "some talking, others playing cards, and others sleeping," a picture worthy of a Dutch painter of the seventeenth century. Those who kept their vigil until the dawn "fortified themselves with draughts of champagne," believed to have been supplied by M. Pataud, the so-called "King of the Electricians," who, "after touring as a curtain-raising lecturer with M. Paul Bourget's play, La Barricade, has now established himself in Paris as a wine-dealer,"—an amusing and practical reminder of the connexion between active revolution and ardent liquors. At half-past nine on Thursday morning M. Lepine, the intrepid Prefect of Police, accompanied by a number of police officials and detectives, entered the building and arrested five of the ringleaders and conducted them in cabs to the Sauté Prison.
