midday
First he beheld himself dimly , as through a veil of mist , convulsed with rage at the recital of how the troops had attempted , in the darkness and quiet that precedes the dawn , to disarm Paris by seizing the guns on Montmartre heights . It was evident that Thiers , who had arrived from Bordeaux , had been meditating the blow for the last two days , in order that the Assembly at Versailles might proceed without fear to proclaim the monarchy . Then the scene shifted , and he was on the ground at Montmartre itself -- about nine o'clock it was -- fired by the narrative of the people 's victory : how the soldiery had come sneaking up in the darkness , how the delay in bringing up the teams had given the National Guards an opportunity to fly to arms , the troops , having no heart to fire on women and children , reversing their muskets and fraternizing with the people . Then he had wandered desultorily about the city , wherever chance directed his footsteps , and by midday had satisfied himself that the Commune was master of Paris , without even the necessity of striking a blow , for Thiers and the ministers had decamped from their quarters in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs , the entire government was flying in disorder to Versailles , the thirty thousand troops had been hastily conducted from the city , leaving more than five thousand deserters from their numbers along the line of their retreat . And later , about half-past five in the afternoon , he could recall being at a corner of the exterior boulevard in the midst of a mob of howling lunatics , listening without the slightest evidence of disapproval to the abominable story of the murder of Generals Lecomte and Clement Thomas . Generals , they called themselves ; fine generals , they ! The leaders they had had at Sedan rose before his memory , voluptuaries and imbeciles ; one more , one less , what odds did it make !