commissioned to extort outrageous advantages, with threats, from Messrs. Gozlan. Our quarter had a loose and dejected look. People went furtively, seeking news, and doors half opened regretfully. Here and there groups formed and lamented in undertones the public authority's lack of foresight, the insufficient measures for preserving order. Rumors were peddled about on the progress of the demonstration. "They're crossing the river." "They're at the Calvary cross-roads." "It's a march against the castle!" I went into Fontan's. He was not there, and some men were talking in the twilight of the closed shutters. "The Baroness is in a dreadful way. She's seen a dark mass in the distance. Some young men of the aristocracy have armed themselves and are guarding her. She says it's another Jacquerie[1] rising!" [Footnote 1: A terrible insurrection of the French peasantry in 1358.--Tr.] "Ah, my God! What a mess!" said Crillon. "It's the beginning of the end!" asserted old Daddy Ponce, shaking his grayish-yellow forehead, all plaited with wrinkles. Time went by--still no news. What are they doing yonder? What shall we hear next? At last, towards three o'clock Postaire is framed in the doorway, sweating and exultant. "It's over! It's all right, my lad!" he gasps; "I can vouch for it that they all arrived together at the Gozlans' villa. Messrs. Gozlan were there. The delegates, I can vouch for it that they started shouting and threatening, my lad! 'Never mind that!' says one of the Messrs. Gozlan, 'let's have a drink first; I'll vouch for it we'll talk better after!' There was a table and champagne, I'll vouch for it. They gave 'em it to drink, and then some more and then some more. I'll vouch for it they sent themselves something down, my lad, into their waistcoats. I can vouch for it that the bottles of champagne came like magic out of the ground. Fontan kept always bringing them as though he was coining them. Got to admit it was an extra-double-special guaranteed champagne, that you want to go cautious with. So then, after three-quarters of an hour, nearly all the deputation were drunk. They spun round, tongue-tied, and embraced each other,--I can vouch for it. There were some that stuck it, but they didn't count, my lad! The others didn't even know what they'd come