So long as the town is not assaulted, and they do not take part in sorties, they cannot be said to be actively heroic.

A blockade such as the Prussians have instituted round Paris, is no doubt most disagreeable to its inhabitants.

In submitting to it, undoubtedly they show their patriotism and their power of passive endurance.

Heroism is, however, something more than either patriotism or endurance--it is an exceptional quality which is rarely found in this world.

If the Parisians possessed it, I should admire them; because they do not, no one has a right to blame them.
The newspapers have now proved to their own complete satisfaction that Count Moltke's assertion respecting the defeat of the Army of the Loire can only refer to its rearguard, and although no news from without has been received for several days, they insist that the greater portion of this army has effected its junction with that of Bourbaki.