"E PLURIBUS UNUM!" The world, with delight, Looks up to the starry blue banner of night, In its many-blent glory rejoicing to see AMERICA'S motto--the pride of the Free!
"E PLURIBUS UNUM!" Our standard for ever! Woe, woe to the heart that would dare to dissever! Shine, Liberty's Stars! your dominion increase-- A guide in the battle, a blessing in peace!
"E PLURIBUS UNUM!" And thus be, at last, From land unto land our broad banner cast, Till its Stars, like the stars of the sky, be unfurled, In beauty and glory, embracing the world!
The twenty-second of February, 1848, found Paris in a condition which only a Napoleon or a Washington could have controlled. The people felt and acted like a lion conscious that his fetters are corroded, yet still some what awed by the remembrance of the power which they once exercised over him.
Poverty and want, licentious habits and irreligious feeling, had contributed to bring about a ferocious discontent, which needed only the insidious and inflammatory articles spread broadcast over the land by designing men to fan into an insurrection.
Louis Philippe and his advisers exemplified the proverb _Quem Deus vuls perdere, prius dementas_, determined upon closing one of the best safety-valves of public discontent. The Reform Banquet had been prohibited, and _apparently_ well-planned military preparations had been made to meet any possible hostile demonstrations, and to quench them at the outset. Troops paraded through the city in every direction, and every prominent place was occupied by squadrons of cavalry or squads of infantry. Nevertheless, soon after breakfast the people collected at various points, at first in small numbers; but gradually these swelled in size in proportion as they advanced to what appeared the centre to which all were attracted, the _Place de la Concorde_. Shouts, laughter, and merriment were heard from all quarters of the crowd, and the moving masses appeared more like a body of people going to some holiday amusement, than conspirators bent upon the overthrow of a government.
Just as a detached body of these was passing through the Rue de Burgoigne, a gentleman stepped out of one of the houses in that narrow street, and, partly led by curiosity and partly by his zeal for the popular cause, joined their ranks and advanced with them as far as the _Palais du Corps Legislatif_, where they were met by a troop of dragoons, who endeavored to disperse the crowd. Angry words were exchanged, and a few sabre blows fell among the crowd. One of the troopers, who seemed determined to check the advancing column, rode up to one who appeared to be a leader, and, raising his sword, exclaimed, "Back, or I'll cleave your skull!" But the youthful and athletic champion folded his arms, and, without the slightest discomposure, replied, "Coward! strike an unarmed man;--prove your courage!" The dragoon, without a reply, wheeled his horse, and rode to another part of the square. Just at that moment, another insolent trooper pressed his horse against the gentleman who had joined the crowd in the Rue de Burgoigne. The latter lifted his cane, and was about to chastise the soldier's insolence, when a man in a blouse and a slouched hat resembling the Mexican _sombrero_, arrested his arm, and whispered to him, "Do not strike! you are not in America: France is not as yet the place to resent the insolence of a soldier." Irritated at this unexpected interference, the gentleman endeavored to free his arm from the vice-like grasp of the new-comer, while he exclaimed, "Unhand me, sir! A free American is everywhere a freeman; and these soldiers shall not prevent me from proceeding and aiding the cause of an oppressed people." "Say rather a hungry people," replied the other; and then added with a smile, and in good English, "Has the quiet student of the Juniata been so soon transformed into a fierce revolutionary partisan? What would Captain Sanker say if he could see you thus turned into a hot-headed insurgent?"